


i know why the caged bird sings

by deepestfathoms



Category: Heathers (1988), Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Canon-Typical Violence, Crossover, Depression, Gen, Heather is like a cool dead big sister, Maggie and Veronica are cousins, Mental Health Issues, Movie Heathers Characters, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Panic Attacks, Past Rape/Non-con, Past Sexual Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Veronica Sawyer Has PTSD, Veronica needs a break, i saw an opportunity and i fucking took it, lowkey. Lena’s a Mom Friend
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:46:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 23,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22043533
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deepestfathoms/pseuds/deepestfathoms
Summary: When Alex said she wanted kids, basically adopting her fiancé’s younger cousin isn't what she meant.
Relationships: Alex Danvers/Maggie Sawyer, Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor
Comments: 12
Kudos: 64





	1. Something of Bone

It's raining.

The water pouring out of the sky feels dirty even before it hits the ground, gritty and grimy like everything else in this city. It sluices into the gutters and mixes with God only knows what other filth, lifting and floating discarded food wrappers, newspaper ads, and other bits of refuse. Even a thunderstorm can't wash these streets clean.

The rain pounds over Veronica’s black umbrella, splashing her with stray drops as she half walks, half jogs down the street. A street sign swims up out of the sheeting rain as she nears the corner: 14th and Martin.

She stared stupidly up at the sign for a second, slack-jawed. Her heart, already racing, starts thudding like a hammer in her chest. A fat, grimy drop of water drips off the edge of her umbrella and down the back of her neck, breaking her bemusement with a violent shudder.

Great.Just great.

It's her first day of work, it's raining, and she’s about to be late. And now she’s pretty sure she’s lost.

Taking a deep breath, Veronica steps off the sidewalk and into the street, raising her hand to hail a cab. Her black loafers soak through immediately, chilling her feet to the bone and making her wince; they cost more than she could really afford, but she can't show up to her new job in ratty sneakers. A discarded newspaper wraps around her ankle for a second. She glances down and half the headline (“SUPERGIRL SAVES THE DAY AGAIN—“) jumps out at her before the rushing water pulls it off and away toward the gutter.

She doesn’t have to wait long before a cheerfully yellow cab flashes its lights at her and pulls to the side of the road. But Veronica’s barely taken two steps toward it when a woman steps off the street in front of her, heading for  her cab.

Scrambling forward, Veronica waves a hand like she would do if she were grabbing the attention of a deaf person (she learned that in her ASL class) and the lady turned to her. Her hawk-like features thoroughly intimidate Veronica, but she gathers herself up to her full height of 5’2 and began speaking.

“Please,” She says, with as much conviction as she can muster. “I'm about to be late to my first day at a new job and I can't afford to wait for another cab.”

The lady looks Veronica over skeptically. Her desperation must be convincing, perhaps how young she is appeals to emotion, too, because she steps aside and gestures for the girl to take the cab.

Dripping and demoralized but victorious, Veronica thanks the woman profusely and then slides into the backseat of the cab.

“Twenty-third and Washington,” She tell the driver. “As fast as possible, please.”

The cab pulls away from the curb in a muddy wave, weaving in and out of traffic in a way that makes Veronica decidedly nervous, given the way the cabbie is looking at her in the rearview mirror instead of at the road. She huddles into her wet clothes and watch the windshield wipers flop rhythmically back and forth, trying not to check the time every five seconds.

The radio is tuned to a couple of talking heads debating civil rights for aliens.

“Alien rights are  human rights,” One of them says, but she's interrupted by the other shouting, “You want a Mars-man teaching your kids? Maybe staying late to help them with their homework, all alone with their venom and claws and fangs? Is that what you want?”

“What's the big hurry?" The cab driver asks. The car cuts across two lanes to make a sudden right turn, leaving a cacophony of horns and screeching brakes in its wake.

“New job,” Veronica says. “And I'm late.”

The cabbie makes a sympathetic face at the girl in the rearview mirror. “I hope the job's worth it.” Then, he squints at her before raising his eyebrows up, “What’s a kid like you rushing around for a job, though?”

This isn’t one of those occasions where someone older is mistaken for a teenager, Veronica truly was young. Barely seventeen, baby-faced, and awfully small,she wasn’t offended by his prodding question.

“It‘s a big job. How could I say no when college tuition is a thing? I, err, graduated early. Skipped senior year.” She says, trying not to grab the ceiling handle as the cab starts to fishtail in the half-flooded intersection.  I asked him to go fast, after all. “I'm in, umm, business, I think? I’m working under Lena Luthor.” 

The cabbie equivocates, rocking his hand back and forth. ”Ah, that woman.”

“This is 23rd,” Veronica points out when the driver seems to be about to miss the turn. He wrenches the wheel to the right. The cab hydroplanes through the pool of water that used to be an intersection and for a second it tilts crazily onto two wheels. Veronica grabs for the ceiling handle again and hung onto it with white knuckles, but the cab makes the turn and settles back onto all four wheels with a squeaking complaint from the suspension.

The driver grins at the girl in the rearview mirror. “So, what are you going to be doing for Luthor? Running the whole thing?" He winks.

Veronica forces her fingers to peel away from the handle, trying to relax.  Just a few more blocks. “Intern.” She tells the driver.

His grin gets wider despite the lackluster job. “But I bet you'd rather be the big cheese, wouldn't you?” He's not even pretending to watch the road. Veronica’s hand creeps back up toward the handle.

Veronica snorts.  Of course I would. “Maybe someday,” She says.

“Oh, come on," He says, goading her. “If you were in charge, what would you do?”

“Well,” She starts, “first of all, I'd make sure the press likes me.”

The driver nods knowingly. “The mainstream media has too much power in this country.”

“They tell the stories,” Veronica agrees, “but if you can get them on your side, they tell  your story, the way  you tell it to them, whether it makes you look good…or someone else look bad.”

The driver grunts. “Way they tell it, anyone who doesn't share their agenda ends up looking bad.”

Veronica slouches down further into the backseat of the cab. The rain slows, then stops. As the driver turns the final corner, a ray of sun bursts through a break in the clouds, glinting off the cracked, slippery sidewalks and flashing rainbows over the oily slicks coating the asphalt. It might be silly, but Veronica can feel her heart lift at the sight of that little beam of light.

Then the cab pulls up in front of the CatCo building, and her heart drops right back into the hole it just crawled out of.

Veronica pays the cabbie, wincing at the cost of the fare, and stepped out of the cab, stumbling a little to avoid the muddy puddle lapping gently at the curb cut. The few steps between the curb and the storefront suddenly seem like an impassable distance. She hunches her shoulders uncomfortably. It's stopped raining, but her jacket is still damp and it scrapes wetly against the back of her neck as she walks.

Finally, the threshold is crossed and Veronica is inside. The chill of the AC creeps into her bones and the clean, crisp smell of the building tickles her nose. Everything looked so refined, even the people just in the lobby. A few of them are looking at her, probably wondering why a teenager was standing in their office and not in school.

“Excuse me,” Veronica awkwardly shuffles up to the front desk and the woman typing away at a shiny silver laptop looks up at her impatiently. “I’m looking for Lena Luthor.” The woman quirked an eyebrow, most likely thinking this was some sort of joke, so she’s quick to continue, “I’m-I’m her new intern. Can you just point me in the direction of her office?”

“Forty-fourth floor,” The woman said, pointing at the elevator.

“Thank you,” Veronica dipped her head in thanks, “Have a good day, ma’am.” With that, she scurries off to the elevator.

Ready or not, She thought as the floors passed by,  Here I come.

It seemed, though, that she was the one who was not ready, because stepping onto that floor was like diving into Time Square on New Years. People were weaving every which way, holding papers or laptops or mugs full of their caffeinated lifeblood. Everyone was talking, the several TVs played dozens of channels at once, and the sound of clicking computer keys and pages flipping was nearly as loud as the voices- whether they be on the televisions or right there in the room- themselves.

Veronica almost immediately got trampled when she sidled out of the elevator. She leapt to the side, apologizing frantically to someone she hadn’t even been close to bumping into, and staggered awkwardly on her heels to avoid ruining research by slamming into another person who was tightly clutching a binder full of papers. The back of her shoe got stepped on and nearly came off, but she curled her toes and wedged her foot in further so it wouldn’t get lost in the crowd. After all, showing up to work the first day with only one shoe on would not make a good impression on anyone.

“Woah, there!”

Someone grabs Veronica by the elbow, causing her to tense up at the sudden contact, but the hand helpfully guided her out of the sea of writhing limbs. She looked up to see a tall man with an amused, but friendly smile on his face.

“I know,” He says, “This place is crazy.”

“Yeah,” Veronica nods slowly, glancing wryly at all the people, “Thanks, err...James, right?” She vaguely remembered his face from when she first got to National City a week ago.

“That’s me,” The man said, “So, where are you headed?”

“Miss Luthor’s office.”

“Miss Luthor,” James chuckles, “Oh, she’s going to love you.” He points over at a large room visible through a wall of glass, “She’s right in there.”

“Thank you,” Veronica says in relief, “I’ll see you later!”

She parts from the man, sidling around tables and standing workers to get to the entrance to the room. For a moment upon arrival she just stands there. She can see Lena inside talking on the phone, but her back is turned, which is kind of a good thing because she probably looked weird just gawking at her. After anxiously glancing over at her shoulder at James, who gives her an encouraging thumbs up, she pushes the doors open and steps inside.

Lena’s voice is like honey- that’s the first thing Veronica notes. Despite the sharp tone she’s using to speak to whoever’s on the phone, her voice is still coated in a layer of smooth liquid sugar that grates gently through Veronica’s ears and makes her shiver. The amount of power this woman singlehandedly has in the city rolls off of her in waves. It’s no wonder why she’s as high up as she is.

“And that’s final!” With that, she slams the phone down into its receiver and whirls around like an ebony firestorm, her facial features contorted into a snarl. Her expression relaxes, however, when she sees the teenager standing stiffly by the doors. “Veronica!” She says, eyebrows raising up and eyes widening, “Good morning!”

“Good morning,” Veronica responds quickly, worried about her boss getting angry if she didn’t reply fast enough. “Is everything, umm...okay?” 

“What?” Lena follows Veronica’s gaze to the phone, which was somehow still intact after she smashed it back down into place. “Oh! Yes, yes, everything is fine. Just normal business.” She chuckled lightly, then eyed the girl standing before her. She weaves around her desk to her a closer look. “You’re soaked!”

Immediately, Veronica was looking over her shoulder, making sure she wasn’t tracking mud into the very clean and neat office. She shifts awkwardly on her feet, inwardly cringing at the way her soaks squelch in her sodden shoes. 

“Oh, yeah. It was, uhh, raining.” She glanced at the large windows that looked out at the city. “...But I guess you already knew that.”

Lena laughed, finding the girl quite endearing. 

“Yes, I did.” She says, “So, are you ready for your first day?”

“Yes!” Veronica says quickly, hoping she isn’t laying her excitement on too thick, “I won’t let you down, ma’am.”

Lena quirked an eyebrow at the girl and smiled.

“I’m sure you won’t, Veronica. I hired you for a reason.” She says, which makes Veronica’s heart flutter. “Now, your first course of action is very simple. There’s a coffee shop downstairs. Can you go get me something?”

“Of course!” Veronica says, nodding quickly. She took the order and then scurried out of the office, passing by James and a pretty blonde lady in glasses, who she confidently tells her assignment to.

“Ah, coffee runs,” The young woman- Kara, if Veronica remembers her name correctly- says with a light chuckle and knowing nod. “I remember when I had to do that.” She smiled cheekily, “But hurry, kid. Lena doesn’t like to wait.”

Veronica instantly leaps into action, bustling past the pair with a quick goodbye. She gets into the elevator, but is immediately corned by dozens of other people. Instead of pushing her way through the crowd to press the button for the floor she needed to go to, she let herself be packed against the wall. There, she waits until the amount of people diminished enough for her to go press the right button. She was stopped, however, by a smell. It was faint, but there was definitely a metallic scent in the air.

Wryly, Veronica stepped off of the elevator and began sloshing down the hallway of whatever floor she was on. She had her nose raised slightly, as if she were a bloodhound tracking down a wounded rabbit, and eventually came to a door at the end of the corridor, which now seemed eerily silent. The name  ‘RILEY RAMIREZ’ is displayed in big, black letters on the golden plate beside the door.

“Hello?” Veronica calls out, knocking carefully on the door. 

No one answers.

As she peeks inside, she can see an office chair lying on its side on the floor just past the door. The whole situation starts to feel very wrong. Veronica can feel her heart thumping in her chest as she takes the final few steps and fully emerges into the room. Inside, the smell is much stronger. 

Veronica pauses at the doorframe, and the sinking sensation in her stomach turns into a hot, hard knot. At first glance, the office is deserted, but there are signs of a struggle. There's the office chair, for one thing, lying on its side with its wheels in the air. Beyond it is a blocky metal desk, its wood-veneer top crazed with rumpled papers and a computer keyboard with several keys missing. A scattering of pens litters the carpet, along with the black plastic cup that once held them. Next to the desk is a black messenger bag, lying on its side, with the silver corner of a laptop sticking out of it.

The sound of her own breathing is harsh in Veronica’s ears. Over it she can hear something else: the droning beep of a telephone left off the hook. A phone cord stretches across the desk from a jack in the wall, diving over the side opposite her, down to the floor.

The sound of the phone spurs her into action. It's clear that someone's broken into the office. She needs to call the police—and make that infernal phone stop whining. She crosses the office to the desk to do exactly that, but she’s stopped dead by what's on the other side of the desk.

A woman is lying on the floor in front of the desk. The first thing Veronica notices is that she's facedown and curled into a position that would be extremely uncomfortable, her arms and legs splayed in a way that indicates something worse than mere unconsciousness.

The second thing she notices is the dark splotch of blood staining the carpet all around her head. Her short, black hair trails in the edges of it. The back of her cream-colored blouse is torn open, and deep, angry, red claw marks rip their way down her back, stopping at the waistline of her black skirt.

Veronica drops to her knees next to the woman, grabbing her shoulder to turn her over. When she sees her face, the thundering of the blood in her ears rises up to deafen her, and for a second she’s looking at the world through tunnel vision. She takes several deep breaths, trying desperately not to pass out.

It's Riley Ramirez, as the nameplate beside the door had said. A manager for Lena. And judging by the gaping red horror that used to be her throat, she is very, very dead.

The world spins for a second, and Veronica clench her hands into fists until her fingernails drive painfully into her palms. Then everything steadies, and she can breathe again, although she’s still hyperventilating. She fumbles in her pockets and came up with her phone, then nearly dropped it. Her hands shake as she swiped in her password and dialed her boss’ office number.

“Hello?” Lena’s voice sounded in her ringing ears.

“Miss Luthor,” Veronica says, trying not to pant into the speaker.

“Veronica? What are you calling me for?” Her tone becomes teasing, “Did you forget my order already?”

“No, ma’am, I’m-“ Veronica drags her hand across her forehead, which is soaked in cold sweat, then rakes her fingernails through her hair. “It’s Riley- Riley Ramirez, she’s-“ Her head is spinning; everything is going too fast. 

(You would think she’d be used to the sight of dead bodies)

She can hear Lena asking if she’s okay, but, instead of answering, she blurts out: “She’s dead.”

Silence on the other end of the line. 

When Lena finally speaks, she's very quiet. 

“Is this some kind of joke?"

The gates break open and words come spilling out: “No, ma’am. I just got down here, and I went into the office because I thought I smelled something, and she's- she's dead, she's on the floor and something tore her throat out, there's blood everywhere—“

“Slow down," Lena says. “Take a deep breath, honey. I think you may be having a panic attack.”

She definitely is.

Veronica swallowed thickly and nodded her head, even though Lena couldn’t see it. She stupidly glanced over at the gored throat of the dead woman and nearly choked all over again.

“Sorry,” She finally whispered.

“Don’t apologize, dear.” Lena replied and the pet name made Veronica feel a little bit better, “Are you sure she's dead? Have you called the police?"

That sets Veronica back a second. 

“N-no, not yet. I thought it would be best if you knew first, so we could decide how to handle it. When the story gets out…”

“I understand completely, Veronica," Lena says. “You did the right thing, but now you need to call them. I'll be there as soon as I can.”

The police arrive quickly, which is at least a little comforting. There are three of them; one of them stays outside and starts questioning anyone in their line of sight, while the other two barge right into the office.

“Are you Veronica?” Demands one of the cops. She seems to be in charge; her partner is trailing a step behind her, poking at a tablet with a stylus.

Veronica nods from where she’s hunched against the wall.

“I just got here for work, and when I went into the office, I found her.” She’s aware that she’s babbling, but the cops don't seem to pay it much mind. Maybe babbling is normal for people who've just found dead bodies.

(She can confirm that)

“Okay, Veronica,” The cop says. “We're going to have some questions for you, but for now, just take us to the body.”

The police swarm over the office, if two people can be called a swarm, taking pictures, making notes, and talking to each other. Veronica paces the outer room nervously, knowing this was just the beginning of the full investigation that would begin very shortly.

More cops show up a few minutes later. One of them gets that yellow tape out and strings it across the door.

The cop who seemed to be in charge comes out of the office at last. 

“Excuse me, Veronica,” She says. “We've got a few questions for you if you're ready to answer them.” When the girl nods, she continues, “I'm Sergeant Bell Evans. I know you've been through a lot this morning, but anything you can tell us might help us find out who did this to your friend.”

“She wasn't my friend,” Veronica says. “She was a coworker.”

“Either way, I'm sure it was a shock,” Evans says. “Now, I doubt this will come as a surprise to you, but it looks as if Ms. Ramirez was killed by an alien.”

Veronica was taken aback by that. Sure, she had heard about National City and surrounding locations having aliens, but she didn’t think they would ever do such a thing like this. They all seemed so peaceful.

“I don't know what to say,” She tells Evans. “I mean, yes, it looked like she was attacked by some kind of animal.”

“Did Ms. Ramirez have any friends or associates who were aliens?" Evans asks. 

“I don't know,” Veronica admits. “Today is my first day.”

Evans whistles. “Hell of a first day.”

They’re interrupted by a commotion and the sound of heels clacking loudly on the polished tile. Lena was striding down the hallway with a sharp glint in her eyes.

Evans starts toward her immediately, one hand outstretched. “Ma’am, this is a crime scene. You need to leave.”

Lena stops, looking angry. Veronica steps forward. 

“Sergeant Evans, this is Lena Luthor. My boss.”

Evans relaxes a bit at that, but she doesn't back off.

“Riley,” Lena murmurs. “Is she…is she really dead?”

Evans sighs. “I'm afraid so, ma’am,” She says. “It's good that you're here. I'm going to need to ask you some questions.”

She draws Lena off to one side and starts talking to her, nodding frequently and taking notes. It seems as if they've both forgotten that Veronica was there, however a crime scene investigator notices her and walks over. He asks her to sign a paper with her signature and then write an eyewitness statement. By the time she’s finished, Sergeant Evans was done talking to Lena and she corrals the girl again. The officer wants to know absolutely everything: how she got here, what time she arrived, whether she came right in. She drills into Veronica for details about her conversation with Winn and her interactions with other coworkers. She even asks how much the cab fare was.

The same questions, over and over. Who, where, when, why? Veronica starts to worry that Evans is trying to catch her in a lie, but she knows she didn't do it, so there's nothing she can do to her—right?

Evans questions Veronica for what feels like hours, but at last she stops. 

“Thank you very much for your time, Veronica.” She says. She hands the girl a business card. “I may call you if I have more questions for you, but I hope you'll call me if you remember anything else that may help us find Riley’s killer.”

“Of course.” Veronica says. She felt limp, like a wrung-out washcloth. She checked her phone- it's barely 10:00 AM, and she’sas exhausted as if she’d worked a double shift. Evans shakes her hand, collects her partner, who's been questioning others on the floor, and leaves. 

Lena clears her throat behind Veronica, making the girl jump and spin around. 

“I had Mr. Olsen call the staff and tell everyone to go home,” She says. “You should go home as soon as you can, too.” Veronica feels a stab of guilt that the woman handled that herself. 

“I doubt anyone would be able to get any work done, and we need to get a cleaning crew in here before…" Lena trails off, looking distressed. It's the first unpracticed expression Veronica’s seen on her face.

“I'll handle the cleaning crew,” Veronica says quickly.

Relief spills over Lena’s face. “I'm glad I can count on you, Veronica.” Her voice then softens and a frown settles back on her lips. She sets a hand on Veronica’s shoulder. “Are you alright? You’re very pale... You look like you’re about to be sick.”

“Yeah,” Veronica breathed out softly, “Just...shocked, that’s all. But-“ Her stomach roils like a nest full of restless snakes, “Can I go to the bathroom before I go get the janitors?”

Lena perks up, eyes widening at the comment. She nods quickly, already batting Veronica in the direction of the bathrooms.

“Yes, of course. Go take care of yourself.”

Veronica nodded and hurried to the restrooms. When she gets inside, she doesn’t get sick, but she does hunch over the sink and paw cold water on her face. She stays rooted in that position for awhile, just trying to steady her rapid breathing. Then, she moves to stand upright. 

She knows what has to be done.

Summoning the ghost of someone who she’s never really met feels scratchy and uncomfortable, but it's the work of a moment with sharp a corner on a toilet paper holder on the back of your hand to begin.

As soon as Veronica’s blood starts to flow, her vision greys faintly at the edges and a soft whispering hisses in her ears. Out of the corner of her eye, smoky shadows gently swirl as if caught in a light breeze. The blood has stirred the ghosts' interest; sleeping as they do in the underworld, they hunger for the bright life above.

Blood magic is tough work even beyond the obvious injury. Veronica’s brow prickles with effort as she focuses her energy toward Riley’s ghost. It pulls against her despite the lure of blood, but, eventually, she shimmers into view, her face and hair death-white and her appearance flat and unsteady as if she has been sketched out on a piece of grey cloth blowing in wind. She wears the same skirt and blouse as her corpse had, but where the corpse's clothing is beige and black, the ghost's matches her pale skin.

Her wolf-like, noble features are as clear and detailed as they seemed to be in life. It's so soon after her death, and she left a strong enough imprint on the living world that her ghost hasn't yet dissolved and blurred.

Riley frowns at the girl before her. as if trying to see through fog. When she speaks, her voice is the rustle of leaves on stone. 

“Child...?”

Dying must be a disorienting experience, especially when you’re brought back by a teenager you don’t even know. Best for Veronica to answer quickly, or Riley’s confusion could snap her connection to the living world.

“I’m Veronica, Miss Ramirez. Veronica Sawyer.”

“Veronica,” Riley whispers, “Yes... I remember Lena mentioning you...”

She lifts her bare, wispy hands to stare at them and clenches her jaw.

“I ought to have known. Too many enemies in this damn business.” Her head snaps up, “Was this you? Did you do this?”

Veronica is ruffled by her accusation, but is understanding with why she distrusts her.

“Please, trust me when I say it wasn’t me. I’m trying to help you.”

“You understand I have to think of every eventuality,” Riley says, and although her voice is dry and dusty she sounds herself. Her gaze shifts around the bathroom, occasionally at the mirror where her reflection wasn’t present, and then she closes her eyes, deep in thought. A heartbeat passes—two, three. She remains motionless. Somewhere outside in the hallway there is a loud commotion; Riley’s ghost flickers unsteadily, her edges pulling away from herself. Veronica gives her more blood to strengthen her connection.

As the blood flows, Veronica’s head pounds. Riley’s shade slowly solidifies and her fingers clench into claws. She lets out a whispering scream. She grasps for Veronica’s hand and when she cannot grip it, screams again.

“I was working,” She spits. “I had no visitors or meetings planned. They came in. A surprise, they said. But their face was sallow and they wouldn't look at me. They had claws. I was too slow."

Her image shudders, and she convulses violently.

“Who?” Veronica asks.

“I-“ Riley falters, “I do not know. It happened so quickly.”

Veronica frowns. She wants to ask more questions, but she knows better than to pry into a ghost she doesn’t know. 

“I see,” She says, “Thank you. I’ll find who did this to you.”

Riley furrowed her eyebrows. She opened her mouth, probably to ask why exactly this teenager she didn’t have any relation to was doing this for her, but must have thought against it, because she just nodded silently. 

“I want to see them down here with me.” She says before her figure flickers out of existence.

Veronica releases a sharp breath and pants heavily for a moment before grounding herself. She shook her head and used a paper towel to soak up the blood still oozing from the back of her hand.

Her questioning of the ghost didn’t bring her any answers, but it was something, at least. Although, she might have wasted too much time, so she hurried out of the bathroom to find the cleaning crew. 

After stepping out into the hallway, she saw more investigators down at the crime scene. Among them was a familiar face.

“Veronica!”

In an instant, Veronica is engulfed in strong, but warm arms. She’s tense for a moment, but then returns the embrace. It brings her some comfort.

“I was so worried about you,” Maggie said, cupping her cousin’s cheeks. “When I heard about what happened, I came as quick as I could. Lena said you found the body. Is that true?”

Veronica nodded and Maggie pulls her back into another hug. One of her cousin’s hands is set against the back of her head, like it was trying to block any other horrific images from entering her brain.

“Oh, Veronica,” She said softly, “I’m so sorry. Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Veronica nodded. “I’m okay.”

“You’re bleeding!” Maggie noticed the cut on Veronica’s hand and she’s quick to inspect it.

“I scratched myself in the bathroom,” Veronica explains quickly, “On a corner. I’m fine, really.”

Maggie doesn’t really look convinced, but she drops it, for now. 

“Alex is going to drive you back to the apartment, alright?” Maggie said, “I don’t want you going home alone.”

“Wait, I want to help you!” Veronica reprimanded, “I’m majoring in forensics on my online classes- I can help!”

“Lena said you looked like you were about to pass out,” Maggie pointed out.

“Well, that’s because pathologists don’t usually find the body.” 

“You’re going home, Veronica,” Maggie said. “You need to do your school work, anyway.” She smiled fondly at the way Veronica grumbled softly. She pressed a quick kiss to her cousin’s forehead, “Alex is waiting outside. We’ll both be home as quick as we can, okay? Lock the door with the deadbolt. And text me when you get to the apartment!”

———

Upon arriving at the house, Veronica obeys Maggie and locks the door with the deadbolt and texts her telling her she got home safe. She knows better than to not listen to a detective. 

The apartment she now lives in with Alex and Maggie feels safe. It’s felt safe since the day she arrived a week ago. 

(Her parents thought it would be best for her to live somewhere else after she got diagnosed with PTSD. They said that a new change of scenery would be good for her, but she knew she was too much for them to handle.)

However, at that moment, she felt...watched.

Veronica whirled around from where she was getting water and a long spine drilled through the air, crashing into the wall. The bluish figure that nearly got impales looks very offended.

“Don’t do that!” Veronica yelled, “You startled me!”

The ghost of Heather Chandler smirked. She glides weightlessly over to the spine and pulled it free from the wall. It retracts from her hands, sliding back into Veronica’s shoulder. The hole it created in the teenager back drools out blood and Heather’s form becomes clearer.

“You need to stop jabbing your bones everywhere,” The ghost finally spoke. She inhaled the sweet scent of her anchor’s blood, “One day you’re going to stab someone.”

“If you hadn’t scared me, that wouldn’t have happened,” Veronica struck back. “And I’m still getting used to it, okay?” She rolled her shoulder, “It feels weird.”

Heather laughed. “Growing your bones into different shapes and using them as weapons feels weird?” She gasped. “I had no idea!”

If she was trying to make Veronica smile, it worked. The girl gene giggled softly.

“Now, turn around.” Heather twirled her hand in the air. “Let me patch up your back before any ghosts claw their way to you.”

Veronica obeyed and turned her back to Heather. She felt the ghost part the torn fabric of her shirt from where the bone had grown through, completely ruining the top in the process.

“Hold still.” Heather instructed.

Even though Veronica knew what was coming, she was still stricken by Heather spitting a mouthful of chemical-laced saliva onto the wound directly above her right shoulder blade. The fluid was freezing cold and stung when it leaked into the injury, but began filling the cracks of the torn flesh, bubbling and burning before hardening at a rapid rate. In just a few seconds, the wound was closed.

“There has to be a better way to do that,” Veronica cringed, “I don’t exactly like being spit on.”

“Well, I think it’s funny.” Heather tittered. “It’s better than the boys using branches to sew it back together, isn’t it?”

“...I suppose so.” 

“Exactly. So stop complaining.” Heather jabbed Veronica in the back of her head.

“Where are the boys, anyway?” Veronica asked while unlocking her laptop.

“Who knows?” Heather shrugged. 

“Can you go find them for me? I have something I need you guys to do.”

Heather looks skeptical.

“Please? I’ll be giving you blood.”

Appeased, Heather nods and disappeared. When she appeared again, twenty minutes had passed and Veronica was dutifully doing college work on her computer. 

“What’s our mission, boss?” Ram grinned widely at Veronica. Coils of ivy and stems shift around the bullet hole they’re covering on his neck. A single orange flower was growing out of the bramble shield, its roots seemingly being in the gunshot wound. The petals were open up wide.

“A murder happened at my work today,” Veronica explained, noting the worried glint in the ghost’s sunken eyes. “I tried talking to the woman who got killed, but she didn’t seem to know much. Do you think you can find her and talk to her? Her name is Riley Ramirez.”

“You can count on us!” Kurt said. The crimson flower sprouted from the bullet hole in his chest flexed its petals at his excitement.

Veronica smiled and then winced as two small protrusions of bone began to slide out of her palm. Once they were around four inches out, they fanned out to the side, opening deep lines down either side of her hand, one running in between her thumb and pointer finger.

“This should be enough, right?”

“It should,” Heather nodded. “We’ll be back as soon as we can.”

“Thank you.” Veronica said before they disappeared. 

Silence settled through the apartment. Veronica sat quietly on the couch, watching the blood flow from her hand. She laid back, pulling her laptop onto her lap before getting back to work, not bothering to clean up the red furrows.

Hours pass before one of the ghosts show up again. Ram’s flower is speckled with neon yellow excitement as he drops a white bird mask on the coffee table.

—————

It was nearing two in the morning when Alex and Maggie finally returned home. They both trudged through the doorway, completely exhausted from working on the murder case. However, their evening brightened slightly when they saw the platter of cookies waiting on the kitchen counter with a note that read,  “For when you get back :)”

“How sweet,” Alex chuckled, taking a bite out of one of the cookies. “Looks like she was waiting up for us.” She pointed at the girl asleep at the dinner table.

Maggie smiles fondly at her cousin as she walked over to her. “I’ll get her, you go get ready for bed.”

Alex nodded and swiped another cookie before heading for their bedroom. Maggie looked down at Veronica before picking her up carefully, doing her best not to rouse the girl as she carried her to her room. Upon setting Veronica in her bed, it’s only then that she notices the angry red cuts running down either sides of her hands.


	2. Of Rats and Birds

A helicopter blade slices through the air, inches away from Supergirl’s face, filling her nostrils with the smell of burning metal. She doesn’t have time to process this, however, as a ball of flame unfurls in her direction.

She leaps onto a neighboring rooftop and tumbles around a smoldering chunk of engine. Today was supposed to be her day off, but when she saw a news chopper careening out of control above the city, she couldn't just stand by like a common pedestrian.

As she pulled clear of the wreckage, Supergirl saw that the ejected pilot floats high above the rooftops from a parachute—one that is crawling with licks of flame. It won't be long before the parachute burns through and the pilot drops hundreds of stories to his death, so Supergirl launches from the building, swooping around on a strong air current to catch the man. Carefully, she brings him to the ground, putting out the flaming parachute with a blast of frost breath before leaping into action again.

However, she was barely off the ground before the spiraling helicopter was caught by something.

People gasped and turned to see an azure-cloaked figure standing in the middle of the street, suspending the burning chopper by six long tendrils that seemed to be growing from their back. Their boots skid across the asphalt as the weight of the machine pushes down on them, so two more limbs emerged from their waist and anchored into the back of the helicopter. With the machine now stabilized, the mystery person lowers it cautiously to the ground, retracting their tendrils once it was down completely. 

Bone. Those things were their bones. 

Whispers and murmurs whisked through the crowd that had formed. People were asking Supergirl who that was, if they were a friend of hers or if they were an enemy, but she just stared in silence, as confused as they all were.

The person turned its head slowly to gaze upon the crowd. The long, white beak that protruded from the dark blue hood around its head was iconic. Before them all...was a plague doctor. Or, at least, someone dressed up as one.

The black glass that covered the eyes shimmered in the faint moonlight. It took one step back, crunching debris under its black boots, then took off in a sprint. The sudden movement jarred Supergirl from her daze and she flew after the figure, easily catching up to them when they veered into an alleyway. She landed in front of them, eyeing the stick attached to their hip, but if they could manipulate the growth of their bones, then a staff was the least of her worries.

“Who are you?” Supergirl called out. 

The figure didn’t reply. They moved one foot back, but didn’t run just yet. Slowly, they raised their hands in the air.

“I’m not-“ Supergirl was confused by their actions. “I’m not going to turn you in. You saved those people.”

The figure’s hands flutter and form shapes, but Supergirl has no idea what they were trying to communicate to her.

“I don’t know what you’re saying.”

Their arms drop limply to their side.

“Who are you?”

No reply.

“What did you do out there?”

No reply.

“Can you speak?”

A slow shake to the head.

“Oh.” Supergirl thought for a moment. 

The figure pointed over their shoulder and looked up at Supergirl. 

“You...” Supergirl did her best to stay professional and knowing, but she had no clue what this person wanted. “You want to leave?”

A nod.

“It is late, isn’t it? Maybe we’ll see each other again?”

Another nod. 

The figure turned, then stopped. Before their ran off into the darkness, the waved at Supergirl and she saw the smallest glint of human eyes beneath the black glass orbs in the mask.

—————

“It was so weird!” Kara said, leaning against the circular island in the DEO computer room, “I was about to go catch the helicopter when they came out of nowhere! And stopped it with their BONES!” Her eyes are wide as she swivels around to face everyone, “Their BONES!”

“Osteokinesis,” Alex murmured, “Incredible.”

“Wait, so they can control bones basically?” Winn asked, twirling around in his chair.

“The user has complete control over the bones of oneself and others,” Alex explained. “They could rip anyone’s bones out of their body with just a flick of their wrist.” At that, Winn casts a wry glance down at his ribs.

“What alien can do that?” James asked.

“None that I know of,” Kara said and glanced over at Mon-El, who gave a helpless shrug. 

“Whatever they are, people seem to like them,” Winn points a pen at the multiple TV screens displaying news reports about the bird-masked figure from the night before. “The Bluebird, huh? I guess that fits with the mask and cloak color... Man, if we lived in Europe, I bet they would be seen as a villain. Did you know plague doctors are a sign of death?”

“Then why would they choose that mask to save people?” James said.

“To change the stigma?” Mon-El offered.

“Kara,” J’onn spoke up, taking control of the situation, “What did you find out about them? Are they a threat?”

“I don’t know,” Kara said, “They couldn’t speak. Besides, I don’t think they’re hostile. They seemed...sweet. In a weird, bird kind of way.”

“Even so,” J’onn said, “This person is a race not even I know. We need to know more about them, just in case.”

“Okay,” Kara held her hands up, “I’ll keep an eye out. But finding a bird in this city isn’t going to be easy.”

———

It was, in fact, not easy.

Supergirl’s been listening to the rain for several hours. It flows down the window of the front room of the DEO building in sheets and drums against the roof in an unsteady rhythm. 

After awhile, a strange feeling blooms in the air, like static. It’s the best thing that’s happened in hours, so Supergirl flies outside and hovers in the rain. 

The city around her is grey in the light of the storm, and the buildings stretch on until they're lost in the haze. The air feels heavy, and something prickles at the back of Supergirl’s neck. Eliza and Jeremiah have taught her to always trust her instincts, and right now they're telling her something is coming. It's not just nerves—there's something out there.

Supergirl shifts to a strong air current and swoops down to the city. She can hear Winn and Alex chatting on the earpiece she has on, but she’s not really listening to them, even when they address her. All her attention is taken away and she feels like she’s in a trance that was cast on her from the sensation in the air. 

That was, until she saw the mask.

Supergirl whirled around and landed in front of the Bluebird hard enough to crack the asphalt beneath her feet. The sodden cloaked figure leapt backwards in surprise and Supergirl can see a jagged bone extended from their palm, ready to strike.

“I’ve been looking for you.” Supergirl said, “I have some questions.”

Bluebird did nothing, said nothing.

“First of all, what the hell are you doing out here in this storm? You look insane. And that mask definitely isn’t helping.”

They tilt their head slightly, almost like a puppy, and it’s kinda cute in a weird sort of way.

“People think you’re a bad omen, you know.” Supergirl went on, “A superhero, but one that scares them. Is that what you are? Are you a superhero?”

They straighten their neck.

Supergirl tries to look into their eyes- their  real eyes- but the glass in the mask is fogged up. However, she’s sure they aren’t looking at her.

When she speaks up again, her voice is very soft.

“What are you?”

Bluebird moves very slowly. They reach down and take their stick off of their belt. Then, they step forward and hold the staff out in front of Supergirl, who gives them a strange look.

“Are you...trying to get me to go away?” She guessed. “Protect me? If you haven’t realized it already, kid, I’m indestructible.

Bluebird taps her with their stick, but she doesn’t budge.

“What is it? Are you...scared?”

The cloaked figure swung their head around and tipped their beak at a sewer grate a few yards away. They reach a gloved hand out without looking away from the street and grabbed Supergirl by the arm, pulling her with them when they stepped back.

“What’s got you so spooked?” Supergirl asked.

“Kara?”  Alex’s voice sounded in Supergirl’s ear from the earpiece,  “What’s going on?” 

“I found them,” Supergirl replied, “They seem scared. I don’t know why.”

“Be careful.”  Winn piped up, “I’m getting some weird signals back here. ”

Supergirl was about to ask for specifics when the sewer grate rattled. The grip on her arm tightened and she looked down at Bluebird, who was definitely quivering slightly.

“What is it?” Supergirl whispered.

Bluebird raised their beak and behind the glass eyes was terror.

The sewer grate continued to rattle until it went flying, landing several feet away with a loud clanking noise. Out of the hole crawled...a rat?

Supergirl released the breath she didn’t realize she was holding and laughed. She shook Bluebird’s hand off.

“Its a rat!” She exclaimed to both Alex and Winn and the street. “ This must be the lab rats everyone always mentions!”

She looked back at Bluebird, who was very still.

“What are you gawking at? It’s just a...rat...” When Supergirl looked back, she realized more rats were emerging from the sewers at an alarming rate. With them came a thick, black mass bubbling out of the hole. It’s churning over itself, like it's struggling with something within. The rats swarm it, skittering and engulfing it’s darkness.

Supergirl leaps into the air. She looks down to see Bluebird frozen, so she goes back down, hooks her hands under their arms, and brings them up with her.

“What is that thing?!” Supergirl demands, watching the thing grow bigger. She tries to zap it with her heat vision, but the hole it creates just heals together in an instant. She’s about to blast it again when she notices something- a person!

The unshaven man appears high as she stumbles out of an alleyway. He stares at the mess emerging from the sewer, then looks up to gawk at National City’s superhero holding a bird-mask wearing figure in the air.

“Sir!” Supergirl yelled, “Sir, you have to get out of here!”

The man snorts, his eyes full of scorn. He takes a drag from his cigarette and then speaks, “What is this bullshit? You aliens are always messing up our city!”

“Sir, please!”

“I don’t like your attitude,” The man growled and stalks a few steps away.

A few steps too far.

A tendril of inky blackness snaps forward and whips around his leg. He stumbles, howling in pain.

Supergirl is screaming before she can even realize it. For a moment, she releases Bluebird, who scrambled comically in the air as they fall, but she catches them before they could break their spine on the asphalt. She sets the masked figure down and then rushes forward, eyes glowing molten orange.

“Kara! Kara, what’s going on?” Alex yelled in her ear.

“There’s something here!” Supergirl yelled back. Out of the corner of her eye, she notices that Bluebird has gone to the man’s aid by grabbing his hand and is now attempting to pull him free. “We need backup! Hurry!!”

She turns her full attention to the creature writhing in the streets. Several arms emerge from its body, gripping the ground with enough force to shatter the asphalt beneath its fingers. When she uses her heat vision again, it just regenerates like last time. Angry by her attack, it swings a massive black arm and knocks her from the sky. Supergirl lands in a heap on the sidewalk in front of a restaurant, where people watch on in fear.

In front of her, the monstrosity fights Bluebird as they try to pull the civilian free. Supergirl watches as two bulky bone limbs slide out of their back and anchor themselves in the ground. It helps some, but the tentacle is still crushing the man’s leg in its grip. They all hear the sizzle of burning flesh, and the man in Bluebird’s arms heaves a great sob. Supergirl leaps up to try and help, but a hand comes crashing down on her, pinning her to the ground. Rats scamper down the oily arm and start to swarm her, prodding her orifices with their filthy noses, seemingly looking for an entrance into her body. One was about to force its way right into her mouth and chew out her tongue when a thin tendril of bone jabs it through the stomach. 

Bluebird’s assistance is enough to snap Supergirl out of her horror and she shoved herself up, beating the monstrous hand in strength. Her eyes light up marigold and she singes the rats around her until they’re nothing but charred ashes upon the ground. Any that cling to her body when she stands are ripped in two with her bare hands. She then her turns her fury to the monster, but her rage falters by a horrible tearing sound.

The man shrieks as the flesh on his arm rips slowly, like the bursting of seams. First the skin goes, then the muscles and tendon, and, finally, the bone. Tendrils wrap around his wrists, then his legs and throat. He's dragged into the black, writhing mass as his arm gave way, flinging Bluebird onto their back, and there's nothing anyone can do to help. His screams continue for several seconds before dying out.

Bluebird sits up shakily, but freezes when they see the bloody severed arm they still have in their grasp. Stricken by terror, they stare at it, trembling. Supergirl lands beside them, eyes still glowing, watching as the creature rears up, using some of its arms as legs. Bulging, oily tentacles wave out everywhere and Supergirl leaps in front of Bluebird, wrapping them protectively in her arms as the tendrils whip loudly against her back. With a burst of strength, she leaps away, still holding the masked figure in her grasp. 

They both fall to the ground in a tangle, but at least the sensation of hitting the ground seemed to jar Bluebird out of their horrified trance. They sit up slowly and Supergirl can hear heavy breathing coming from their mask. They’re clearly shaken, and she was about to tell them it was going to be okay, when a tentacle coiled around her waist and yanked her backwards.

Supergirl is swallowed by darkness.

The cold crushes her chest and she can’t breathe. She can feel her limbs, wrapped up by inky tentacles, burning intensely. The tiny paws of rats scamper over her torso and stomach. Fangs start to gnaw on her eyelids and ears and lips, and she can’t do anything about it. 

She opens her mouth to sob, but only a hissing breath worms its way from her throat. It also gives entrance to a rat, which sticks its snout into her mouth, prodding her teeth and tongue and gums. She releases a second freezing breath and, this time, it does something.

Icicles grow along the darkness. Her body rocks as the creature shudders from the cold battling its own. Taking this as a good sign, Supergirl breathes in as deeply as she can and exhales a blast of freezing death breath inside of the monster. 

A scream bubbles in her throat. She howls as she rips her arms free from their monstrous bindings, screeches until she can see the wine-dark sky from a tear in the monster’s body. 

Something is cutting away at its flesh. With it half-frozen, it seems more susceptible to attacks, so Supergirl blasts it with her heat vision. The hole it creates doesn’t patch up this time. And, from it, she sees the flash of a white mask.

Needles of bone stab through the creature, just barely missing Supergirl. They rip down to the ground, which gives Supergirl enough room to leap out into the air. She plummets almost instantly, but she’s free. 

As she’s gasping for breath, she sees Bluebird scampering away from the seizing body of the monster. It’s whitened from the frost breath and completely shredded. Rats scatter out of it as its body shrivels up on itself and then- boom. The monster explodes into tiny bits and pieces, absolutely soaking Bluebird and Supergirl- as if they weren’t already messy enough.

The two of them just stare at the spot it used to be in for a moment. Then, Bluebird is moving, rushing over to Supergirl and kneeling down next to her. They’re fretting over her silently, reaching out trembling fingers and hovering them over angry red bite marks on her ears and nose and lips and eyelids. 

“I’m fine,” Supergirl croaked, batting their hands away. When they shake their head and reach out again, she continued, “Really, I’m okay. I’m okay...” She sat up and winced in pain. The bites were starting to burn; Alex was going to have to check that out.

Speaking of Alex, cars skidded to a halt in the street. DEO agents are swarming the area. Bluebird is on their feet. Once again, Supergirl gets a glimpse of their amber eyes- they’re wide beneath the glass.

“Go.” Supergirl said, “Run. I’ll see you soon, alright?“

Bluebird looks at her helplessly.

“It’s okay. Go. And thank you.”

They continue to stare, then turned abruptly and ran off into the fog.

Supergirl watched them go before rolling over, groaning softly in pain. Inky sludge drips off of her head, splattering loudly on the street. 

When some of it drools into her mouth, it tastes like corpses.


	3. get down, show me what you’re good for

It's early Monday morning, and Veronica already has one of those headaches, the ones that feel like her skull is about to burst open. 

Her cousin’s kitchen is lit by a single fluorescent light on the ceiling. The world outside is still dark, the streets empty. The city has not woken from its slumber yet. For a moment, the sound of the wind overwhelms everything else—the soft buzz of the light, the antique analog clock on the wall, her own breath. There is nothing in the world but these raging gales and the slight drizzle of water falling on the window. 

Veronica catches a glimpse of her face in the glass.

The light makes her eyes look hollow.

“Bad night?”

Kurt is perched on the counter, kneeling in a way that makes him look like a monkey. His flower is dappled with grey-blue concern.

“Yeah,” Veronica nods with a sigh. She stretches her back, wincing at the pain that radiates up her spine. “Have you gotten anything on that Riley woman yet?”

Kurt shook his head. “I think it’s a lost cause. When we can find her, she doesn’t say anything useful. Just...mumbles.” He gets a curious look from Veronica, so he continues, “She talks about the darkness, a lot. We can barely understand her. It’s so weird.”

“It sounds weird,” Veronica scratched the top her head, equally confused. “I guess you can tell Heather and Ram to drop it, then.”

“Why do you want to solve this so badly?” Kurt asked, tilting his head at her.

“To prove myself, for one,” Veronica said. “I want to be a pathologist. It’ll be my job to help solve cases like this. Bring the person to justice.”

“And what if you do solve it?” Kurt said, “What’ll you tell everyone? That your ghost friends told you who the killer was?”

Veronica is quiet. She hadn’t thought of that until now.

“I’m just saying-“

“No, yeah, I know what you’re saying.” Veronica said, “You’re right. I need to be able to have proper evidence, too.”

“I think it’s something else as well.” Kurt went on, “This whole ordeal. Am I right?”

Veronica doesn’t answer. Kurt’s flower wilts slightly, grey-blue fading to a shade of charcoal. He extends a hand to her, then pulled back, glancing quickly over his shoulder.

“I’ll see you later.” He whispered before disappearing.

Veronica closed her eyes for a moment and remembered what it was like to feel normal. 

The howling wind outside finally calms as she picked up the sharpest knife and started slicing bread.

———

When Alex woke up hearing a slight clamor in the kitchen, she, naturally, had to go check it out. However, she wasn’t expecting her fiancé’s younger cousin to round on her with a gleaming kitchen knife in her hand.

The look in Veronica’s eyes was...feral. 

Alex stepped away, one of her hands instinctively shooting to her waist, only to find no gun. She looked back to Veronica, who is pressed against the kitchen counter, shrunk it on herself slightly.

“Veronica?” Alex said softly. “Hey, it’s okay. It’s just Alex. I’m sorry for scaring you.”

At the sound of her voice, Veronica blinked out of her daze. The knife clattered fo the floor as the girl leapt backwards, eyes practically bulging out of their sockets. She stammered and tripped over her words, before finally settling on a stuttered apology.

“It was my fault,” Alex said. “It’s okay.” She knelt down to pick up the knife, glancing momentarily at Veronica’s arms. “What were you doing?”

She remembers what Maggie told her when Veronica first got here: Veronica was suffering from a pretty severe case of post-traumatic stress disorder, although nobody really knew why, and had a tendency to sink into depressive spirals at times. 

That being said, Veronica holding a sharp knife while alone in the kitchen at six-thirty in the morning was a little concerning.

“Making breakfast,” Veronica said shyly. “I didn’t mean to wake you. I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t wake me.” Alex assured her. “Mind if I join you?”

“Oh, ah...sure!” Veronica smiled slightly and turned back to the bread.

“So,” Alex started, hoping to make small talk with her future cousin-in-law, “How have you been? Adjusting well?”

“Yeah... _WELL_ .” 

Words more or less began to fly from Veronica’s mouth like uncovered popcorn on a hot surface. It seemed like she had been bottling up a lot, or maybe she was just afraid of not getting to talk fully if she didn’t speak fast enough. 

_Poor kid,_ Alex thought _, She must be so lonely._

“Today- err, yesterday was  shit. ” Veronica spit, and Alex is slightly stunned to hear the usually very timid and quiet girl swear, “I fucked up another thing at the copier at work and Mr. Olsen said it was okay pretty much only because he  understood that this was a--" She paused to do air quotes with her fingers. "-- _'rough time'_ for  me. And I thought that was literally the stupidest understatement I've ever heard so I was thinking about it  _all day_ and getting really mad and then, like, an hour ago I thought, dude, it _IS_ a fucking rough time for me, and I decided to do something nice and fun with all these freaking groceries the social worker made me buy, so I was like,  YEAH  I'm gonna do a bunch of cooking in the morning! And then I realized I hadn't thought the situation through clearly enough because holy shit, this is way too much food, but then! Then I remembered I have you and Maggie now! Do you like oatmeal?”

Everything came at Alex so fast her mind had to scramble to process everything.

The first thing she thought about was Veronica and her work problem. Of course the girl was going to struggle, she’s never done anything in a business like CatCo before. Hell, the kid just turned seventeen! She shouldn’t be working for such a big company! However, Veronica had too much anxiety to work in retail or fast food, and Lena had offered her the job of intern the first day they met, so she couldn’t really turn that down.

Next was the whole social worker ordeal. That made Alex’s heart hurt. Despite Maggie taking her in, it seemed like Veronica was still considered an orphan.

God, Alex wanted to punch the girl’s parents in the throats.

Thirdly, there was all the food. Now she knew where it all came from. She had been wondering about that.

“Don’t worry, I used my own money!” Veronica continued, thinking Alex was cross with her when she didn’t answer. “My social worker keeps acting like a therapist. She said going out to the store would help with anxiety. Well, it didn’t. Because I told the clerk I loved her instead of telling her to have a nice day and now I’m never going there again.”

Veronica ended her statement with a grin and Alex laughed. In stark contrast to the (relatively) sharply-dressed girl the woman met two weeks ago, Veronica was dressed in baggy sweatpants and an even baggier shirt with the words “Trust me, I’m a doctor” and a picture of a plague doctor on it. The head poking out at the top had hair that was sticking out in all directions. It made her look smaller than she was (although 5’2 was very small). Younger, too. Sometimes Alex had a hard time believing she was in college now. 

(Although, in her defense, Veronica graduated early, so, technically, she should be a senior.)

The sight made Alex’s heart ache again because it was a reminder of how unfair everything she'd gone through was, even if she herself didn’t know the story behind the trauma. A girl Veronica’s age shouldn’t have to suffer the horrors of the world. Not yet.

“Big cities and business jobs take time to get used to,” Alex said, “You came from Ohio, right?”

“Yeah,” Veronica nodded, “Basically in the sticks of Sherwood. 

Alex whistled. “What a change.” She said, then glanced over at the pot bubbling on the stove, “So...oatmeal?”

“Aaaaand cinnamon toast-- I mean I haven't made that yet because it takes like two seconds and I don't want it to be cold when the oatmeal’s ready, but I got all the fixings!” 

“You’ve got everything sorted out, huh?”

“Pretty sure,” Veronica said, “Wanna help with the toast?”

“Y'know, I used to make a mean cinnamon toast, back in the day."

A crooked grin replaced the plaintive look Veronica had been wearing, and she turned around to pick up a loaf of bread. “You know I'm not gonna believe that until I taste it, right?”

“Heh. Guess I'd better back up the claim, then.”

Veronica beamed magnanimously and handed Alex the loaf, which she set down on a nearby cutting board. With a rumbly clearing of the throat, Alex pushed her sleeves up and rubbed her hands togther.

“Alright. Melt a little butter in the microwave and grab that cinnamon I see over there. If I'm gonna make this bread, I'm gonna do it  _right_.  "

They set to work with a bustle as Alex cut the bread and Veronica retrieved the necessary ingredients and dropped them on the counter next to her, pausing every so often to check on the oatmeal bubbling on the stove.

“Hey, you mind if I unmute the TV or put on some music or something? I need some background noise.” Veronica said after awhile, nodding in the direction of the Alexa on the counter and then glancing momentarily at the TV.

“Sure,” Alex said, “Just keep it down so we don’t wake up Maggie. And none of that skippity-bop or whatever it is you kids listen to. I don't have the stomach for that.”

She was teasing Veronica by acting older than she actually was, and the sickened look the girl gave her was completely worth it. Alex bursts into laughter.

“It's called  _hip hop_ , Alex.  _God_.  I know you aren’t THAT old! What are you, twenty-four?”

“You are now my new favorite.” 

Veronica beamed at that then padded over to the Alexa. She spoke to it to turn it on and began asking for different kinds of music stations until a thumping electric beat started to pulse in the air.

“You want the neighbors to think you're holding a dance party at six in the morning?”

“Maybe I do!”

Alex chuckled. “Can you grab a tray I can stick these on?”

“Yeah!”

Veronica bent down to retrieve a baking tray from the clutter of pans in a lower drawer, and by the time she'd straightened up, she already had another idea.

“Oh  man!  You know what'd be great? I have about  _five billion kinds of lettuce_ in the fridge because I was dumb and went shopping while I was hungry the other day. We should have a  _salad!_ Caesar! With croutons and crap!”

“You can leave the crap off of mine, thanks."

“You know what I mean,” Veronica hissed playfully. “Here’s the tray. I’ll go start watching the lettuce!”

Veronica threw open the fridge and leaned in, gathering armfuls of vegetables. Alex watched this with a fond shake of the head before returning to her own task. It sent a pang through her chest, brushing the butter and sugar and cinnamon across the fluffy bread like she had all those years ago, back before she was wrapped up in alien nonsense and law and Jeremiah was still there...but it wasn't so bad. Being in a bright kitchen and listening to music she'd never willingly put on of her own volition was miles better than trying to do the same thing in her own one. She had Maggie now, too. She wasn’t alone. And, with Veronica around and doing this with her...Alex almost felt like a mother.

A timer buzzed and she sidled over herself, seeing as Veronica was already occupied. When she stood straight again after sliding the pan of bread into its place, she wiped the sweat from her brow and looked back over to her young companion-- only to find her rocking and head-bobbing in place as she shredded lettuce with her bare hands, tossing it into the bowl in time to the punchy music on the radio. Alex found herself shaking her head again, this time in amusement.

“Glad you're happier than you were when you first got here.” 

(She looked like she had been hit by a truck, her remains were burned by a flamethrower, and then she was poorly put back together.)

“Mm,” Veronica replied distractedly, snapping her fingers jauntily to the tune. “I'm not, actually. I'm just kinda faking it till I make it. You know?”

“Oh,” Said Alex, suddenly feeling very worried. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have assumed.”

“S'okay. Means I'm doing it right.”

Before Alex had a chance to ask if she was okay with her Mom Voice, as Kara has dubbed it, the song on the radio changed and Veronica’s eyes lit up.

“ Oh man! I  _love_ this song!”

She flung the last of the lettuce leaves into the bowl and started to dance even more enthusiastically (and goofily), pumping her fists in the air.

“Wait, don’t tell me this is-“

“It’s Smash Mouth! The ballad of the 90's! Shrek's themesong! You've seen Shrek, Kara said she made you watch it with her last month. C'mon, dance with me!"

The worry quickly became a mixture of exasperation and amusement.

“Veronica, I don’t think-“

“C'mon! You don't have to break a hip or anything, just move around a little! It's impossible to be completely bummed when you're dancing.”

Alex closed his eyes and sighed deeply. Then started to slowly step side to side.

“—Aw man, NO. Is that the Carlton? NO.”

“Hey, you whelp, don't make fun. There is NOTHING wrong with the Carlton."

“NOPE. Not allowed! Jazz it up a lil'!"

Finally succumbing to deep laughter, the DEO agent found herself picking up her feet and turning in place. And, as an afterthought, even threw in some jazz hands. 

After all, what could it hurt?

———

God, Veronica hurts. 

(Maybe dancing around at six in the morning wasn’t such a good idea after all...)

Her back’s a scarred ruin. Bones in her ribs grind when she breathes. Her poorly-put-on work clothes rub uncomfortably against her spine.

But, still, she strides on. She had a job to do, after all. A very high status, earthshakingly important job.

She had to give Lena Luthor her coffee.

The girl carefully stepped into the office, haphazardly holding a journal and binder under one arm and stapled papers under the other. Her boss, who had been examining all the TVs in the room, turned around with a smile.

“Good morning, Veronica.”

“Good morning, Miss Luthor,” Veronica replied. She holds out the cup she’s carrying. “Your coffee!”

“Why, thank you,” Lena takes it and Veronica feels more accomplished than she probably should be. “Have you seen the news?”

“Can’t say I have,” Veronica said, properly taking all her belongings into her hands, “What’s the tea?” Lena gives her a confused look at her Gen Z slang. “Oh! Sorry. That’s a thing we said in school. What’s the scoop?”

Lena chuckled and then nodded at one of the screens, where a news anchor is talking about a picture of a person in a bird mask. 

“Woah, is that a plague doctor?” Veronica said, “That’s so cool! I was OBSESSED with them sophomore year. On Halloween I dressed up as one and my friends, the Heathers, almost tied me to the top of the car for it.” She laughed at the memory, but couldn’t help the sinking feeling of sadness in her stomach. “What’s a plague doctor doing on the news exactly?”

“They caught a helicopter that was falling out of the sky,” Lena explained. “With their bones, apparently. And helped fight a creature yesterday. People are saying they’re National City’s new hero.”

“But Supergirl is here?”

Lena shrugged. “Who’s to say there can’t be two?” She said. “Now, I need you to go- hey, are you okay?”

Veronica hadn’t even realized she was hunched over and wincing until Lena said something. She felt the woman’s hand rest upon her shoulder and her touch is so calming for some reason.

“I’m fine,” Veronica whispered. Lena didn’t seem to buy it, so she stood up straighter and said again, “I’m fine. My back just hurts a little, that’s all.”

“You looked like you were about to collapse.” Lena said. Her concern makes Veronica’s heart flutter.

“I’m okay, ma’am. I promise.”

Lena looks Veronica up and down, presumably searching for any wounds. When she finds none, she sighs and nods.

“Alright.” She said slowly, “There’s some accounts I need you to run for me,” She hands several files to Veronica. “Can you get them done by the end of today? It’ll help me a lot.”

“Of course, ma’am!” Veronica said, “I’ll get it done.”

Lena smiled at the girl. “Good.”

———

To her credit, Veronica was able to finish all of the accounts, but it already late at night when that happened. She trudged into Lena’s office, where her boss was working with just as much energy as she had this morning. Somehow.

“I finished everything, ma’am,” Veronica said, hoping her exhaustion didn’t slip into her voice.

“Very good, Veronica!” Lena praised with a smile, “That will have helped me a lot.”

“Is there anything else you need?” Veronica asked.

“Not today,” Lena said, “You should head home, now. Have a good night, dear!”

“You too!” Veronica called over her shoulder as she exited the office and headed towards the elevator. 

Lena waited for the girl to completely leave the floor before she stood up and opened the door to the balcony.

“Alright, she’s gone,” She called out, “You can come out now.” She stepped back as Supergirl landed before her, careful as to not completely ruin the terrace with her strength. Lena smiled at the heroine, “Hey.”

“Hey you,” Kara grinned, striding into the office. “It’s about time!”

“Impatient, are we?” Lena teased, making Kara wrinkle her nose, “This isn’t a date, Supergirl.”

“Unfortunately.” Kara sighed, but her smile quickly returned, “But, yeah, you’re right. I’m here for business!”

Lena chuckled lovingly at her natural golden retriever-like excitement.

“So, what is it today?” She asked, leaning back against her desk with her arms folded neatly over her chest. “Runaway alien? Nuclear weapon dissolved in the sky?”

“Bird hunting.” 

Lena quirked a brow.

“You’ve heard the news, haven’t you? About the Bluebird.” Kara said. “Well, I’m looking for them. And I remember you saying you took ASL in high school, so I was hoping you could translate for me when we find him.” 

“Him?” Lena furrowed her eyebrows, “What makes you so sure they’re a boy?”

“Winn was using male pronouns, so I’m just jumping on the bandwagon.” Kara raised her hands.

“I’m pretty sure they’re a girl, Kara.” Lena said.

“If you say so.” Kara jibed with a playful smirk. “So, will you help?”

“Of course.” Lena agreed, “Who am I to turn down an assignment with the Supergirl gang?” 

Kara went to make another comment when she caught a siren on the wind with her super hearing. She tipped her head up and then made a move for the balcony door.

“Someone’s in trouble?” Lena guessed, seeing the alarm on her girlfriend’s face.

“Yeah,” Kara leapt in the air. “I’ll see you later!”

With that, she shot off into the night.

—————

“Awh hell. C’mere, little Missy, I’ll give ya some change.”

Veronica froze.

It had looked no different than any of the other dozens of slightly-out-of-the-way pubs she’d seen, apart from perhaps the decorations adorning the walls, which were more odd due to the location. Mounted fish, photos of oldster locals and a glowing pink lady on the wall. One showed a church, half-built. The shades were drawn so that the room would be dark enough to excuse burning those neon lights by the counter all day long, emulating that nighttime atmosphere that Veronica had learned just about all bars had—or at least the kinds  she’d  gone to. People tended to drink more when they couldn’t see how light it was outside.

(She didn’t drink. Not anymore, at least. Not after the Remington Party...)

That being said, simply peeking inside was a huge mistake. She had been hoping she could get coins for the bus and she was too cold to continue trudging on down the street, nor did she want to bother Alex or Maggie by asking them to pick her up. 

She didn’t know why she thought anyone in that grizzly, grody place would be normal.

“Where are your parents, kid?” The bartender said coldly, the conversational tone with which he’d greeted a patron that had come in shortly before Veronica nowhere in sight.

“None of your  business ,” Veronica sniped, puffing herself up like an angry squirrel. “I just need a  some coins. ”

Relenting with a final frown, the tender pointed grudgingly over to the dark corner with the ATM machines, obviously acquiescing only to get rid of her as soon as possible. 

“If you want a quarter, you’ll have to ask someone else for it. I don’t hand out change to spoiled little kids.” He turned back to the glass he’d been polishing, muttering darkly about tourist brats with entitlement complexes.

Veronica’s hesitation made it clear that she had not thought her plan out this far, but the bartender no longer paid her any attention.

After a couple minutes of her bunching her fists unsurely by her sides and glare at the change slot in the ATM machine as though hoping that if she looked angry enough, it would magically pop out enough coins to get onto the bus with, the voice had spoken up.

From the corner of her eye, Veronica could see a group of truckers from which the voice had originated. She didn’t move for a moment, but then figured that these men weren’t stupid enough to try anything in public, so she crossed over.

“Hold up, here, I need a favor first. Can’t just go givin’ money away withou’ gettin’ a little somethin’ in return, the world don’t work like that. How about you give ol’ Uncle Todd here a nice big kiss?”

Veronica’s back straightened so quickly that it sent off a miniature twenty-one-gun salute of pops and cracks down her spine and a pang of agony through her temples as her head whipped upright fully.

She had stopped dead in her tracks, mid-step, and the brief thankful look that had spread across her pale, ashen face had been exchanged for one of wariness.

On occasion, there were people whose voices were the exact opposite of what you’d expect to be coming out of their bodies. Alcohol was one of those things that attracted people of all shapes and sizes and, thanks to her time with the Heathers, Veronica had heard deep death-rattles coming from the scrawniest, weediest-looking individuals and voices like songbirds come out of people big enough that they could crush her head with one hand.

Such was not the case with this man. Ol’ Uncle Todd looked exactly like his voice sounded.

He was an older man, somewhere in his forties or early fifties. Oily, beetle-like eyes were set in a face that was already sweaty and red from too much beer, glinting somewhere in between the brim of a white trucker’s cap and a monster of a bristly black beard. He was big, too. The navy-blue windbreaker he wore was stretched tightly over a muscular chest and a swollen beer gut, and the sausage-like fingers that he was patting the end of his knee and beckoning mockingly to Veronica with looked to be as wide around as one of her wrists.

That is to say, he was rough, enormous, and looked every bit the sort of person who’d trade money for kisses from teenage girls in a dirty, dimly-lit bar.

The group of men he was sitting among were obviously his friends—or perhaps just worked for the same company—because it was clear they liked him. They were all laughing like he’d just told the funniest joke in the world.

“C’mon, Todd, leave the kid alone,” Said one of them, a lanky fellow with a thick skullcap that covered his eyes and a chin of stubble as uneven as a patchwork quilt. But even as he scolded, there was a sick, yellow grin of amusement on his face, which rendered the disapproving words about as effective as trying to douse a fire with gasoline and live dogs. Put a group of cruel men in one place and fill their bellies with booze and they start doing nothing but egging each other on. Veronica had seen it happen more times than she could count.

“Hey, I ain’t doing anything wrong,” beamed Todd with a smart-alecky ‘Who, me?’ expression. It was the sort of look worn by someone who thinks he’s being terribly cute and clever but has failed to realize that once you pass a certain age, the rascal act doesn’t work anymore. “Just askin’ the pretty lady for a kiss. Nothin’ wrong with askin’ pretty little girls like you for kisses, is there, Missy?”

He puckered up a pair of wet red lips that were almost invisible behind the beard and made some kind of grotesque smacking noise that only passed for a kissing sound in his own drunken reality.

Veronica didn’t budge. She had balled her fists at her sides and was standing perfectly still, like a rabbit that had just wandered unwittingly into a den of coyotes and only just realized its mistake. The angry, sizing-up glare was her usual confrontational one, but it too was a façade. 

“I’m  not a little girl , I’m seventeen,” She said haughtily, and if there had been a ‘State the Obvious’ contest going on, she’d have won with that sentence in a heartbeat. The fact that she had to even clarify that at all was a testament to how very, very wrong this entire situation was. “And even if I was, I’d never kiss someone like  _you!_ ”

There was a collective roar as the entire group, Todd included, exploded into laughter, pounding their fists on the table and making the glasses rattle. A few of them laughed so hard that tears, their glistening easily visible in the light of the neon woman, started to pour down their ruddy, drunken cheeks.

Less visible was the angry, humiliated flush that had started to creep up into Veronica’s cheeks, and the way her fists had started to tremble. Frustrated by her own inability to be more intimidating than a bunch of burly truck-drivers who liked to pick on kids. Of course she would be.

(She could always use her bones...)

Eventually the laughter started to die and Todd lifted a hand to wipe the water away from his beetle-black eyes, wheezing.

“You’re a FEISTY little thing, aintcha? HAW HAW HAW! Tell you what, how ’bout you just sit in my lap instead? Just like Santa, eh? C’mon, you’d like that, wouldn’t you? Little girls like Santa, or else they’re _bad_ little girls. You don’t wanna be a bad little girl, do ya, Missy?” His tone was still jovial, but somewhere deep in that mockery of a friendly voice was a  threat , hidden down there like a fishing hook in a slice of bread. The keys attached to his belt jingled as he jiggled his knee in a manner that was almost obscene, garnering a bout of giddy laughter from those of his friends who were drunk enough to still be finding humor in their coworker’s antics.

Veronica could only stand there as the entire scene unfolded, her body as stiff as if it was riddled with rigor mortis. She wanted to run or  yell  or wave her arms or  something , but her feet were rooted to the floor; she couldn’t even budge. Her mental mask had now slipped irretrievably out of her grasp, leaving the paralyzed panic bare on her face. Her heart was hammering and her hands were clenched so hard that her knuckles had turned pure white, painting the nicks and cuts on them an even brighter red.

It was like watching a horror movie, the sort where you could see exactly what was coming and every inch of you ached to yell ‘ Don’t open that door! ’, but knew that no amount of begging would stop the hapless hero on the screen from opening the hell out of that door and being dragged inside, kicking and screaming and completely surprised. Because no matter how obvious it was to the watcher, it wasn’t to the hero.

Otherwise they wouldn’t _be_ the hero.

“I’d rather  die , Veronica said venomously. Trained by the best of the best when it came to needling others, she added, “Go crawl back into the hole you came from, you sick fuck.”

The lanky patchwork-chinned man sitting alongside Todd sucked in an impressed lungful of air and gave him a playful smack on the shoulder, exclaiming, “HOOOOO-eeee, did’jew hear what that little sprout just said about ya? This kid’s got BALLS, man!”

There was another uproarious bout of laughter over Veronica’s spunk.

This time, Todd did not join in.

Instead he sat there, staring levelly at Veronica with both hands laid flat on his knees, which had ceased their wiggling and gone still. He was still smiling, but something was different. A steely glint had entered his eyes and there was a strange,  off tightness to the way he was sitting now.

There was no ripple or twitch that went over his face, or any other real indication that there was anything wrong. It had just suddenly stopped laughing and gone very, very still.

Sometimes people did crazy things when they were drunk. There was always some dumb college kid who woke up naked in someone’s living room with ‘DICKS’ written across their forehead in Sharpie, or some poor sucker who got cocky enough to hit on that hourglass-figured woman in the tiny dress, only to find out that she was happily married to someone named Biff, who had biceps the size of small dogs and also happened to be standing right behind them.

That was normal. That was just people for you. Veronica had seen or heard of all of that and more.

But sometimes, you’d get the individual who had something else wrong with them. Something deep inside, that was there before even a single drop of amber passed their lips. They’d look perfectly normal, because whatever was wrong with them, it was the sort of break that you could patch up with metaphorical glue and hide from the world as long as you had the presence of mind to do so. Then the alcohol melted that glue away and split the break wide open and let all those bad things that were locked away come boiling out like pus from an abscess.

And, out of nowhere, that same calm, smiley person who you were just talking to about the Red Sox-Yankees game could suddenly be pressing your head into the bar with their elbow in your throat, eyes alight with hysterical rage, all because you’d done something as small as accidentally scoot your drink a little too far in their direction.

And right now, somewhere behind those horrifyingly blank eyes and that placid smile, something about Veronica’s harmless, basic teenager insult—one that would have gotten nothing more than a groan and rolled eyes from any normal adult, or any age for that matter—had made those last strands of glue stretch out and break, like the little filament in a light bulb fraying and making that final  _ping!_ sound before it snapped and burned the bulb out.

There was something very, _very_ wrong with Uncle Todd.

And Veronica had seen it coming from a mile away.

“Y’know, there’s nothin’ wrong with being a pretty lady,” Todd said quietly, almost thoughtfully. In some strange way, his voice had grown a little smoother than the rowdy, drunken growl he had spoken in before, and as the words floated up out of the mouth that lurked behind that tangle of hair, something about the room grew colder. “That’s what little girls like you grow up to be, y’know. They grow up and get curvy and then they don’t do nothin’ but hang around places like this, givin’ kisses to all us old sick fucks, ’cause once they all grown up, we’re the only ones that care.”

An uncomfortable silence had descended on the group around him and Veronica knew that they had all sensed it too, that weird light that had turned on behind their colleague’s eyes like the tiny, silvery start of a fire, flickering silently in the corner of a room. 

“...Todd, enough’s enough,” Mumbled Patchwork Man lowly after a time, in a tone much more urgent than his first scolding and without any of the exaggerated rural slang. He wasn’t grinning anymore.

“Shut the hell up,” Said Todd, still smiling. His eyes had not left Veronica—or blinked once, for that matter—and he leaned in slightly, the windbreaker rustling as his gut pressed against his knees. “They don’t do nothin’ else, those pretty ladies, ’cause they ain’t  good  for nothin’ else. You gonna grow some titties soon, little girl, and then you’ll understand what I mean. You know what titties are?”

He raised his hands and clenched them in front of his chest in crude demonstration, as if he hadn’t heard Veronica when she said she was seventeen and not a child, blank smile unchanging. Nothing about his expression had changed, as though it were a photograph cut from a magazine or movie still. He was wearing his own face like a mask.

“I kin show you, if you’d just come over here to Uncle Todd. He could give you a head-start, ’cause that’s what’s gonna happen to  you . You gonna grow up and spend the rest of your life in bars like this’un, makin’ these long business trips for sick fucks like us less lonely.”

Veronica had frozen again, caught in the trucker’s unblinking stare like a doe in the headlights of the vehicle he drove for a living. Her defiance was all but gone. She saw the glint.

Still, because she was better at maintaining the façade than before, and because she didn’t want old memories to resurface, she bunched her fists once more and barked out a shrill, “You’re a LIAR!  Fuck off! ”

Between the high register and the staticky frizzing of her hair, her protests gave the overall effect of a Pomeranian yipping frantically like an unwanted intruder. Ineffective and almost pathetically funny, if it weren’t for the seriousness of the situation.

Undeterred, Todd just leaned in further, his eyes gleaming. There was a hoarse, longing quality to his voice now. The words that he was speaking had a sort of sickening life to them, crawling out of his lips like so many dark spiders and insects that were pouring out of the crack in his head.

“They got a word for that, y’know. They got all kinds of words for what little girls like you grow up to be.”

_The bartender. Why the hell isn’t the tender doing anything?_

Veronica looked over her shoulder frantically, desperately and spotted the tender walking his way with dishcloth in hand, face blank as he determinedly ignored the goings-on in the corner of the room.

“...Stop this!” Veronica faintly heard someone sitting at the bar whisper, “Make them stop,  right now! ”

“She can leave any time she wants,” Said the tender coldly, reaching out with manicured fingers and trying to peel the hand off of his arm, since the person must have grabbed him urgently. All the false warmth from his initial greeting was gone and for just a moment, Veronica had to wonder if there was something wrong with  him , too. Would a normal person just let something like this happen? “She hasn’t had a finger laid on her. A little scare’ll teach the brat not to come into places like this anymore. Touch me again and I’ll have you thrown out on your ass.”

The person pulled away and felt silent. 

“And if you know what’s good for you, you won’t interfere over there, either.” 

With one last cold glare, the tender continued on his way, back turned to the entire scene. He disappeared through a door and into some back room- Veronica heard his boots clop against the floorboards, eventually disappearing, and she was stunned. Did he not hear the sickening words floating out of this dark corner? Had he seriously failed to notice that diseased light in the bearded man’s eyes?

Then it occurred to Veronica that the tender probably _had_ seen it.

He just didn’t  _care_.

No one in the room seemed to care.

Not enough to do something.

And that left Veronica, teetering on the raggedy edge between forcing herself out of her shock or standing there and watching, just waiting for something awful to happen to her.

“I know every one’a those words, little girl. I know what you  are. ”

No one was saying anything now. No one except for Todd, whose voice had gone even quieter, though Veronica could still hear every word through the silence. But she still couldn’t move. Even though she wanted to , so badly . All she could do was watch like helpless prey, with a strange feeling her lungs were burning up. Like she’d been underwater too long without air.

“Know ’em all, from A to fuckin’ Z. Every one a’them pretty little words. I could tell y—hey HEY I’M  TALKIN’ TO YOU! ”

And there it went.

Just like the first snap, there was no transition, no prior warning, no signal that indicated that something was about to happen. It just  did.

Veronica’s feet had finally remembered how to move, and she had started to turn, possibly to run for the door. And this, like the ill-timed ‘sick fuck’ comment, changed everything.

In the middle of his sentence, Todd’s voice had turned into a roar as abruptly and jarringly as someone un-muting a television.

The stool he had been sitting on clattered to the floor as he lurched to his feet so swiftly that Veronica could almost hear the whoosh of air as it rushed into the space that his hulking body had previously been occupying.

And his placid rubber mask of a face  crumpled , contorted like a beer can being crushed in someone’s fist, stretched and broke and cracked around the edges, the flesh twisting into a thousand rage-induced wrinkles and crevices as his eyes squinted, almost like he was going to burst into tears.

The beard finally parted enough to show a black pit of a mouth yawning downwards into an elongated upside-down ‘D’ shape that wobbled and distorted in the dim, flickering light as he clenched ham-sized fists and  howled.

“YOU  LOOK AT ME WHEN I’M TALKIN’ AT YOU, YOU LITTLE  SLUT! ” 

There was a rapid clunking of stool legs and shuffling of feet as the other members of the group scrambled out of the way, finally realizing what Veronica had sensed to begin with and abandoning ship lest one of those fists decided it wanted to find its way around a nearby throat.

Veronica spun halfway around in alarm, only to let out a squeal of alarm as a fist closed instead around her scrawny arm. It didn’t stay there for long, because her immediate and perfectly-justified reaction was to rake her nails across it with such force that there was no way she hadn’t drawn blood. The arm recoiled by pure reflex, but Todd didn’t. 

“PRETTY LADIES!” He bellowed, staring straight ahead, and it was obvious he didn’t see Veronica anymore. He was seeing something else entirely, something that probably only existed in his alcohol-soaked brain. “I  LIKE ’EM!  They make it STOP!” 

He was moving towards Veronica again. His words now made sense only sporadically, like someone banging randomly on the keys of a piano.

Todd was bawling now, mouth wide open like a squalling baby.

“Pretty ladies are supposed to make it feel better! WHY WON’T YOU MAKE ME  FEEL BETTER? ”

Why was nobody else doing anything?

“NO!” Veronica screamed, stumbling backwards before finally, too late, trying to run.

_I should do something, but I can’t. What’s stopping me? I just can’t, like I couldn’t help Heather, Kurt, Ram…_

The earth below the floorboards and building foundation seems to churn beneath Veronica’s feet.

There was a crash and a tinkle of glass. Todd had snatched up a half-drunk bottle of wine and hurled it at the girl, who had shrieked and ducked, falling to her knees in the process, causing it to miss her head by inches and shatter on the edge of a table, showering her with sharp fragments.

The sound, as though jerking him out of some kind of dream, made Todd blink and look down at the cowering child, falling silent for a moment.

Then he reached for her. The gleam in his eyes was so strong it was as though a glossy pair of headlights had been hooked up behind them, making them shine glassily through the river of tears flowing out of them.

He no longer wanted a kiss.

He wanted to feel a neck, frail and brittle like a little bird’s, snapping between his fists. Because that would be just as good as a kiss, in its own way. There was more than one reason that the euphemism ‘choking the chicken’ existed, at least for Todd.

But he wasn’t the only one primed for blood.

The only warning that Todd had was the shuffle-thud of uneven steps.

And if Veronica hadn’t been on the ground, there wouldn’t have been any warning at all.

The bearded man had only just started to turn his head away from the girl he was reaching for, the sound somehow registering through the crack in his mind long enough to catch his attention rather than the movement of his prey.

A split second later and he wouldn’t have seen Veronica coming at all.

There was a horrendous smashing of broken glass and snapping wood as Veronica ploughed straight into Todd, knocking him backwards and directly into a nearby table, which actually snapped under the big man’s weight.

Part of it was pure, dumb luck. Veronica was much smaller than Todd, and despite having a little extra padding from a life without much exercise, a hell of a lot lighter. 5’2 didn’t provide much, but the trucker had been leaning forward, so focused on the his prey’s helplessness before him that he hadn’t been prepared for the sudden, unexpected attack of the one he was trying to grab.

He keeled downwards with an explosive splintering of wood, letting out a surprised grunt. Carried by her own momentum and knocked off-balance by a table leg slamming against her left ankle, Veronica went with him and they both plunged to the floor in a tangle of flesh, fists, and broken green glass.

The unfortunate fellow who had been sitting at the now-trashed table woke from his drunken stupor instantly and scrambled backwards away from the mess with a partly-outraged but mostly- startled , “JESUS CHRIST!”

But it was drowned out by the howl of surprise and rage that came from Todd, which was so powerful that Veronica could feel it vibrate through her entire body.

“AAAARGH! YOU SON OF A BITCH!”

The beetle-black eyes that were glaring into Veronica’s, only inches away from his face—so close that she could smell the stench of daily alcohol abuse on Todd’s breath and feel its sour heat as it pluffed against her tender throat in hot clouds—were no longer lit up with that sick light. As was often the case, that inner crack sometimes knew when to conveniently mend itself back up again. Until the next time it broke open, of course.

But now the eyes were alight with a different kind of crazy, one that was much more commonplace.

Plain, old-fashioned drunken rage.

The entire left side of Veronica’s face exploded into bright, colorful bursts of pain as a fist that seemed to be the size and solidity of a small boulder came smashing upwards and her whole body popped backwards in a fashion that was almost cartoonish. A near-perfect arc, like those old animated shorts she’d watched as a little girl where Daffy Duck or Wile E. Coyote were getting nailed in the face with spring-loaded punching gloves left and right.

However, there was a very significant difference between those cartoons and real life, and the difference was that in real life, it  hurt . It hurt a  lot.

The punch had such force that Veronica thought for one petrified instant that she might do a full flip—but then her back met the floor with an unforgiving THUNK.

She barely had time to clap a hand to the smarting flesh on the side of her face, which she could already feel starting to get puffy, before she heard glass crunching under boot as Todd climbed to his feet, looking more like some kind of hulking mountain rising than a human being.

A terrible, rumbling growl that would be more befitting of a wild animal came erupting out of his throat and whatever part of Veronica’s panicked brain was spitting out all these nonsensical comparisons quickly replaced ‘mountain’ with ‘volcano’. Mouth twisted into a snarl, Todd clenched his knuckles with an audible crack and reached down with alarming swiftness to wrap those sausage-like fingers into Veronica’s shirt-collar, gathering a ham-sized fistful of fabric and sending the cuts scattered across the girl’s back alight with pain once more as they were exposed to the cool air.

“You just made the biggest mistake of yer miserable life,  little girl ,” He spat. “I’m gonna beatchu so hard, you’ll be turned away from the pearly gates ’cause there won’t be anythin’ left of yer face for Saint Peter to recognize!”

As her torso was jerked upwards off of the floor, two main trains of thought were running frenetically through Veronica’s mind.

One was:  _…No. No, I’m pretty sure I know exactly what the biggest mistake of my miserable life was, and it wasn’t stopping some perverted old man from cracking my neck and then raping my corpse._

The other was not in words so much as a series of spontaneous realizations as she noticed the shards of bottle-green glass poking out of the fabric of Todd’s pant-leg, courtesy of the heavy fall they’d both taken onto the debris of table and bottle alike.

Gritting her teeth, Veronica bunched the muscles in her right leg- the one that hadn’t been whacked with a solid beam of table wood- and brought the sole of her boot slamming down against the trucker’s shin.

She had always been a terrible kicker, from as early as the days of being picked last for soccer in every Phys. Ed class, to as recently as a month earlier, meekly attempting to fend off her psycho boyfriend down in a boiler room. But it didn’t take much force to drive a bunch of jagged, razor-sharp fragments of glass through denim and into flesh.

Todd screamed and Veronica’s back abruptly met the floor again as she was unceremoniously dropped.

“AAUGH! You little BASTARD!” Todd howled, his voice tight with agony as he staggered backwards. Any further words on his part just sort of trailed off into a long stream of obscenities as he lashed out a flailing hand for Veronica once more.

But this time something was a little different, and in a strange way, Veronica wasn’t entirely certain that something in her own head hadn’t cracked open a little bit too, because the light from the neon woman’s dress didn’t really look pink anymore.

No…now it was starting to look a little  _red_.

She was not a strong person. That much she was sure of. A strong person would have done something far, far sooner than she had—not been rooted to the floor like a worried spectator on the sidelines of a schoolyard brawl, afraid that a playground monitor might come out at any second and think she was involved.

But for a whole month not so long ago, she had fought tooth and nail, bullet and blade, to survive.

Her, Veronica Sawyer.

She’d been mauled, strangled, shot at, bludgeoned, beaten, thrown, dragged, molested, raped, and ran so long and hard that her lungs seemed ready to burst and her feet felt worn to the bone.

It didn’t matter that she had been terrified to the point of tears at times, or that she’d done just as much fleeing as she had fighting. She had taken on a bomb and  lived , as much as one could say that someone like her could live after everything that had happened. A genuine, honest-to-God bomb, the kind that people worried about, that blew up buildings, that monsters created. 

She had faced a monster, too.

Well…ol’ Uncle Todd might not have had an unwanted penis scrape the interiors of his body, or been suspended from the ceiling because of a fake suicide to escape his maniac of a partner, or serve as the scapegoat for that same psychotic person...but if there was one thing Veronica was sure of, as the memory of the sicklights deep in the back of that trucker’s skull floated in front of his mind’s eye, it was that Todd was just as much of a monster as Jason Dean had been.

And Veronica knew she could fight monsters.

Scooting hastily away from the grasping arms, Veronica snatched up the broken table-leg that she’d tripped on and struck out with it with such ferocity that the sound it made when it rapped across one of those beefy hands rebounded like a whipcrack.

There were yells coming from the crowd around her, but Veronica didn’t care. She could hardly hear them. They were blocked out by Todd’s roars of pain and anger, along with a sort of ringing in her own ears. All the pain leaking into her consciousness from the wounds all over her body were gone, blotted out by the force of the adrenaline rushing through her veins.

It was, perhaps, a sad sort of testament to the effect the last few days that her “boyfriend” was alive had on Veronica that this state of mind had become the norm. It had grown almost as familiar and oddly comforting as the buzzing glow of liquid courage.

Her protective mask had long since abandoned her.

Right now, there was only herself and a monster.

And if she didn’t keep that monster at bay, she would wind up dead.

Veronica ducked under another locomotive-like punch, feeling the wind from it ruffle her hair as it swept millimeters over her head. She wasn’t so lucky for the next swing that came her way and her already-sore waist was the victim this time.

Rocking backwards, the edge of a table against her back was all that kept her from falling. She grasped it with one hand determinedly to shove off from it again, and was vaguely aware of an uproar from the onlookers.

Aside from the dull ache in her side, the full pain failed to register and Veronica launched forwards once more, swinging the table leg back and forth, up and down, heaving it through the air in front of her like an utter maniac. Todd’s fists continued to fly, but they couldn’t hit her anymore. They couldn’t even get close, not without encountering her impromptu weapon.

Frustrated by his sudden lack of ability to hit his smaller, less-muscular, and already-wounded opponent, Todd opened his mouth to howl something else; possibly another volley of abrasive language. But as far as Veronica was concerned, the monster had said more than enough already.

So, for the first time since she’d been standing there as she let ol’ Uncle Todd harass her, Veronica really spoke up.

What came out wasn’t much of words or a battle-cry. It was just a  noise , one that had been boiling up in Veronica’s chest for hours; long before she had entered the bar, or walked into work, or moved to National City at all.

Veronica didn’t yell a whole lot, never had. She’d always had the tendency to quietly brood when her temper ran high or her spirits low, something that had helped facilitate her transformation over the months of becoming apart of the Heathers and then meeting JD.

So in reality, the noise that was escaping her right now was one she’d been holding back for a very long time.

It sounded stupid. But it felt  good.

So she kept doing it.

Swinging the leg like a whirlwind, Veronica went after Todd, not caring whether she hit him or not so much as just pushed him back, and she yelled the entire time. Intimidating or not, when a sound was being uttered over and over by a teenage girl who’d just survived the closest thing to Hell that could exist on God’s green earth, a teenage girl with wild eyes, a bruised face, and a weapon…

It was a goddamn battle-cry.

Eventually the expression on Todd’s face went from violent, to frustrated, to uncertain, and then at last to genuinely worried.

“What the fuck is  wrong  with you?!” He roared over Veronica’s screams, trying to put a table between himself and the crazy girl in the blue coat. “I didn’t do a goddamn thing to you!”

Veronica’s reply was to bring the table-leg down with an enthusiastic crack against one of Todd’s kneecaps, causing the man to bugle with pain and stumble.

Her war-cry finally ceased to be a long string of A’s and formed into grating words that tapered off into howls at their ends, each one punctuated by a swing of the table-leg and a small, splattery spray of red as she spat them out.

“LEEEAVE—!” Swish! “ME—” CRACK! “ALOOOO OOOONE!”

It took a moment for, seemingly, the words to register in the trucker’s broken brain. But when they did, his eyes started to widen. Which made Veronica feel even better than the yelling did.

“I WASN’T GONNA TOUCH YOU!” He hollered, and Veronica was pleased to hear that there was a definite note of fear in his voice. He leaned back to avoid a particularly vehement swing of the leg. His cap had been knocked sideways, taking that ominous shadow off of his eyes. Their whites were visible. Somehow, that made him less frightening. “I WAS JUST TRYIN’ TO SCARE YOU, YOU FUCKING PSYCHO!”

Hearing that one made Veronica almost want to laugh, to cackle like the psycho she’d just been called and say,  _ ‘Buddy, I may be crazy, but anyone here can see that you're the psycho!’  _ But she didn’t. Instead she just screamed, again, “LEAVE ME  ALONE! ”

But her arms were starting to tire, their swinging starting to slow. No amount of adrenaline, pent-up battle cries, or liquid courage could change the fact that her body was hurting and exhausted.

Her decision to turn to her old, numbing standby instead of giving her body what it really needed (a little something called  sleep ) was costing her.

Scared or not,  crazy  or not, Todd knew what he was doing better than Veronica did and, as the table leg made another vicious pass, scant centimeters away from his face, he took advantage of the small window of opportunity while the momentum forced Veronica to carry out the swing.

All the breath in Veronica’ lungs left her in a whoosh and a spray of saliva droplets that splattered onto Todd’s white cap as one of the trucker’s boulder-like fists dipped low and slammed upwards into the girl’s already-bruised stomach. The table leg hit the floor with a clatter as Veronica staggered backwards, her aching ankle buckling underneath her and nearly causing her to join her fallen weapon on the floor.

She’d had the wind knocked out of her more than once during her time with JD, hell, even before that, and she knew that in a few moments, she’d be fine again—or as fine as someone who’d just been socked in the gut could possibly be—but this wasn’t exactly the kind of situation where she had moments to spare for breath-catching.

And on top of that, the human body had a tendency to freak out when it couldn’t breathe. Like, a lot.

She choked and spluttered, mouthing like a fish out of water as she tried to pull air into lungs that just weren’t ready to get back on their feet yet. Through the oxygen-deprived haze that was covering her vision, she saw Todd’s expression return to a confident, determined desire to deliver a world of pain unto his raggedy, coat-clad opponent. The fists clenched again.

One more hit from those would end the fight, and Veronica couldn’t afford to let that happen. Todd’s mask had come back, the invisible glue sealing that crack back up and hiding the sicklights, but they were still there. Waiting.

(Her bones were moaning, her blood was singing. She could use them)

So, the one little part of her brain that was smarter than the rest of it was, the part that only seemed to awaken when she was in immediate danger or dying, spontaneously came back to life and drifted in over the panicked alarm bells in her head like the calm voice of the pilot’s intercom over the clamor of a falling plane full of hysterical passengers.

_Veronica. You don’t need to breathe to spit._

This was true.

So, as Todd came swooping in for the kill, Veronica immediately tried to recall the last time she had spit on someone. The result was pitiful and slightly blood-tinged from her biting a chunk out of her lip, but it hit Todd in the eye and distracted him and was therefore good enough for Veronica.

Caught off-guard, Todd clawed at his eye instantly, as though worried Veronica might have just spat acid at him. The survival-oriented part of Veronica’s brain took this moment to helpfully add,  _ You don’t need to breathe to kick , either. _

So as her chest was trying to heave and not fully grasping why it couldn’t, Veronica once again kicked at the spot on Todd’s leg where she knew the broken glass was embedded, gaining an agonized scream for her efforts.

Howling, Todd threw one punch, too late, in Veronica’s direction. It missed by a mile. Or maybe several feet. Whatever, Veronica was too busy to think about whether or not her hyperbole was accurate. The trucker’s glass-filled leg buckled and he started to pitch backwards. Veronica decided to help him out.

Throwing herself forward, Veronica pushed every ounce of weight in her tiny body into her lunge and slammed into the off-balanced Todd with her right shoulder. It worked.

This time, there was no table to block or slow Todd’s fall and the immense, glass-rattling crash that resulted from the pure, uninterrupted impact of his lumberjack-like body hitting the floor was almost magnificent. Veronica landed on top of him, one knee digging into the bearded man’s gut with a somehow-comical swish from the denim scraping against the windbreaker. The dull roar that Veronica’s ears registered from the crowd around them cast the surreal illusion that this was some kind of spectator sport in the stadium.

_Dirty Old Pedophile versus Domestic Murderer, who will win? Next up on ESPN!_ was giddily chimed in her head by some voice she wasn’t entirely sure was even hers. The intelligent, survival-oriented portion of her brain had apparently shut off again. 

It wasn’t so much a split second that the two looked up and down at each other. Somehow, the descriptor ‘a split second’ seemed too long to appropriately do justice to that freeze-frame of an instant during which their eyes met.

Todd’s were wide enough that Veronica could see herself in them, and  scared  enough that she could almost see the trucker’s very thoughts printed in neat, readable letters over the glued-up line behind which the sicklights waited. He was wondering what the hell had just happened, where this pitiful-looking, mangy little girl had come from and why he, Todd, was not winning the fight anymore. And he was frightened.

To be fair, up close, Veronica probably looked pretty unsettling. What with the bloody lip and wild eyes and all.

This time it was Veronica’s fists that alternately snatched hold of her opponent’s coat collar and drew back in preparation to come slamming downwards. Conveniently, her lungs picked that moment to start re-inflating. The process was so painful that it registered even through the reddish-feeling, numbing haze that had settled over her wounds the moment she’d launched herself into the fight, but she didn’t care. 

Drawing herself up, she filled her aching chest with air and then leaned down to bark straight into Todd’s face, in a voice that was far too high-pitched and croaky to get across the true extent of the anger behind her nonetheless heartfelt words, “Leave me ALONE, you mangy old BASTARD!”

And then she punched Todd in the face. It felt great.

So she kept doing it.

Her punches had nowhere near the amount of force behind them as Todd’s did, but just as that scream had been building up for  hours days months , there was a boiling, bubbling rage somewhere between her battered lungs, and she had a feeling it wouldn’t go away until her bruised knuckles met the flabby, bristly face of the man who had tried to hurt her as many times as they could.

Each occasion upon which this momentous event occurred was accompanied by a word that was harshly grated out through Veronica’s gritted teeth.

“Don’t—you— ever —touch—me— again!! ”

It was hard to tell just how long this continued. Veronica, more than most people, knew how time could pass as slow as molasses or as quickly as a fast-forwarded tape depending on what was happening. She might have been there, pinning Todd down with her knees and slamming her clenched fist down again and again for five minutes, or it could have been five  seconds.  It was really, honestly hard to say.

But the spell ended when a booming, ringing noise cut through the rumbling in her ears. 

It was a gunshot.

She didn’t quite remember falling—it was more like one moment she was doing the punching, and the next she was sprawled flat across Todd’s chest, her face pressed unpleasantly into some sweaty crease between throat and jawline, with wiry, unwashed beard hair prickling against her neck and the stench of beer and cigarette-butt sweat invading her nostrils, even overpowering the reek of her own blood.

It was a blessing that she was only there a couple of seconds before Todd’s shovel-like hands shoved her ungently onto the floor, where she scrambled away, partially hiding beneath a table. 

The lights above swam and shimmered before her eyes. As a ring of faces clambered above her in a circle, it was hard to tell just how many were there in reality because there were multiples floating around beside their twins, like they were all trapped in the corner of a House of Mirrors.

She wasn’t shot, but the panic induced by the noise was enough to make her feel like she was.

Veronica saw the bartender holding a pistol in the air, eyes alit with rage. She scampered back further and her hand crunching beneath shards of glass was enough to do it. 

Before Veronica could form her blood into a weapon, huge, thick roots shot out from the ground, ripping past the floorboards and impaling the bartender straight through the stomach. The bulging brambles suspend him in the air, slamming his body up against the ceiling as a “Fuck you” of sorts. Even after he’s dead, they don’t release him. Other roots start to emerge from the ground, whipping around like angry snakes and striking anyone who got too close. 

Veronica watched from under the table. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a ghostly blue foot step beside her and she looked up to see Kurt and Ram both standing there, their flowers the color of blazing fury. 

“Run.” Was all they said to her, so she did.

Veronica jets out of the bar and, from the outside, she can see the roots flailing from the windows and hear things crashing loudly. At first, she turned to run into the road, but then she saw some of Todd’s friends by the street. When they noticed her, they did not look happy.

“There’s that little whore!” One yelled.

“Get her.” Another snarled.

Veronica turned and ran- something she should have done the moment she had been called over.

She weaves through the alleyways in between the musty houses, eventually coming to a dead end. However, she saw a discarded old ladder near the wall and propped it up against the fence that was blocking her path.

She began to climb as quickly as she can, glancing several times over her shoulder to make sure her chasers weren’t closing in on her. She could hear them nearby, yelling and growling, so she quickened her pace.

Then, she realized exactly why this perfectly good ladder was out there.

Veronica whipped her head backwards, unable to bite back the scream of agony that bubbles up from her throat. The cry morphed into sobbing as she stared in horror at the nail jutting right out of her palm from where she had blindly stuck she hand through it. She bit her lip so hard she felt the skin break and her teeth go through, but that was nothing compared to the white hot agony searing up from her wrist. Her vision was starting to darken around the corners, fading it and out, but she fought through the dizziness. She had to.

She raised her good hand and moved to the next bar on the ladder, pulling herself up slowly. She was so close to the top, then she just had to jump the fence...

Pain flared and Veronica nearly blacked out when she lifted her other hand. The nail proved to be a tough foe, catching on interior skin and muscle as her fingers shook so badly her entire arm quaked. Blood bubbled and squelched loudly, churching her stomach. Acid burns her throat and she hung her head low, completely ruining her work pants. The smell nearly made her sick all over again, but it wasn’t the worst thing. No, that was reserved for when she blindly reached out with her bad hand and grabbed directly onto the barbed wire curled around the top of the fence.

Veronica shrieked again, feeling the iron teeth dig in, finding good purchase in the hole that had already been created by the nail. She took quick, rapid breaths, whimpers and keens of anguish worming from her throat as she pulled herself upwards, curling the fingers of her bad hand around the spaces without the spikes.

She had no choice...

Veronica’s strength diminished as she pulled herself over the top of the fence. The thorns bristling across the wire carved deep, bloody trenches down her palms, completely tarnishing her good hand. Every poke and stab in the raw wounds sent a black blizzard raging across the girl’s vision, but she eventually managed to sling one leg over. 

The pain in her groin was nothing new, at least.

Her heel squabbled in the air before catching in one of the holes in the fence, anchoring her. Veronica took a deep breath and threw her other leg over, but her pants got caught in the process, resulting in a long, ugly scratch being sliced open in her thigh.

For a moment, she thought the barbed wire was holding her up, that she was going to bleed to death like this, but then her body hit the ground. 

Veronica rolled over and writhed, sobbing in pain. She smothers her face against the dirty alley floor, finally giving herself a chance to cry and whimper and choke on the agony.

When she finally sat up and inspected the damage, however, she nearly collapsed back down.

The angry red maw opened in her thigh was far too deep and gushing out blood at an alarming rate.

The femoral artery got torn.

She was going to bleed to death in two minutes or less.

Veronica pushed herself up against the wall, taking deep, heaving breaths that rake through her burning lungs. She pried open her teary eyes and looked back down at the wound, staring hard at it, as if she thought she were Medusa.

Well, her efforts weren’t in vain, because the inside of the gash began to bubble and the blood starts to crystallize. Hardened bits of red crawled through the wound, halting the blood flow and freezing the spew from the ripped artery. Then, spider legs of bone creep out from the femur, through the flesh, and into open air, where they twitch like crab claws before intertwining in the space between one another, kind of like connecting hands. They close together over the gash, holding it together like stitches would, and embed into the flesh again, anchoring their pointy tips into the main thighbone.

Veronica released the breath she hadn’t even realized she was holding and let her head fall back against the wall. The pain blazing through every inch of her body has yet to diminish, but at least the major bleeding was stopped. Finally, she could rest for a moment; she could take care of her hands later.

However, Fate seemed to have other plans, as footsteps began to approach the alleyway on the other side of the fence. Thoroughly pissed off and done with everything, Veronica let quills of bone grow out from her shoulder and bristle menacingly. But they seemed to completely shatter under just the eyes of the person who rounded the corner. 

It wasn’t the decapitated heads they were holding that sent Veronica spiraling into a panic attack.

—————

Alex and Maggie didn’t hear the front door opening and closing, nor did they see the figure standing in the doorway of their bedroom, as they were too transfixed on their conversation and each other. However, when they did- or, rather, when Alex did, she couldn’t help but yell.

“Oh my god!”

At first it was out of just startled shock, but then the glow from the TV caused the blood all over Veronica’s hands to glisten slightly. Then Alex was yelling for a whole other reason and was vaulting out of bed without even realizing it at first.

(Was this what the whole ‘mother’s adrenaline’ felt like?)

Maggie soon followed and she, too, set her eyes upon the mess that was her baby cousin. 

“Veronica? Veronica, can you hear me?” Maggie knelt down in front of the teenager, grabbing her forearms to steady her when she noticed her swaying. “Veronica, it’s Maggie. What happened? Are you okay?”

“I climbed a fence,” Veronica mumbled. Her eyes were heavily glazed over to the point where it was genuinely startling. 

“Veronica, I need you to listen to me,” Maggie softened her voice, making it much more tender and gentle. It seems to catch Veronica’s attention- she was using the tone Lena had...she liked Lena...- so she continued with it, “You’re going to be okay, do you hear me? You’re going to be just fine, I promise. We’re going to patch you up. You’re safe now.”

But she wasn’t.

She was never going to be safe again.


	4. Servitude in The Zoo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> She’s back, baby!!!!!!!!!!

_ Veronica. _

She felt a touch on her shoulder.

_ Veronica, wake up, sweetheart. _

The voice was soft, insistent. She felt a familiar palm rest on her forehead, then slip down to cup her sore cheek. Her breath came out a quiet moan.

“That’s it, honey. Time to come back to us.”

She didn’t want to wake up. She ached everywhere and her head was pounding, but it was too late now to slip back into the darkness. She raised a hand to press against her eyes, but Maggie- she knew her by her touch as much as by her voice- pressed it back down.

“Leave that alone for now. Can you look at me?”

The light was blinding until a shadow moved over her. She pried her eyes open to see her cousin’s face hovering over her, blotting the fluorescent lights from view.

“How is she?” She heard Alex ask.

“Veronica?”

She tried to swallow, but her throat was parched. Her eyes closed themselves against her will- she was so tired.

“Give me the cup, Alex then go get some painkillers. I don’t think Veronica is going to be feeling too well for awhile.”

“You can say that again,” Alex muttered.

She felt cool glass at her lips, then water touched them. She opened her mouth, wincing against the soreness, but the water felt so good, cooling her throat, that she didn’t mind the ache.

“That’s it,” Maggie murmured. “Just a sip more.”

She opened her eyes again and this time saw Alex’s worried face next to Maggie’s.

“‘m okay,” She croaked.

“That’s as may be,” Said Alex with a touch of asperity.

Veronica looked at her, saw a faint thread of anger touch her expression before it went back to worry. She struggled to sit up, gasping at her stiff, painful muscles.

“What happened?” She asked, head spinning.

“We were going to ask you the same thing.“ Maggie’s touch was gentle as she helped Veronica into a sitting position, even if her voice was starting to rise. “All you said was that you ‘climbed a fence’ before you blacked out. Do you know how worried I was?”

She was working herself up into a fine fit, not that Veronica really blamed her.

“I told you to be careful! This city isn’t like your little town. It’s dangerous!”

“No—” She swayed, grabbed onto Maggie’s arm. “Not— You don’t—”

Maggie steadied her. “Shh...” The worried anger dissolves back into gentleness. “Easy... Take it easy, Veronica. You’re in pretty bad shape.”

Images flashed through Veronica’s muddled brain. Memories return to her. The bar, the fight, the escape, the figure on the other side of the fence...

“Oh, Maggie,” Veronica groaned. “What am I gonna do? He’s- he’s still—” Her stomach cramped and she balled up around it with a small cry.

“Just rest.” Maggie gathered her into her arms, calm again in the face of her young cousin’s distress. “We can talk it over later.”

Veronica tried once more to tell Maggie what had really happened, not caring about the consequences of her powers being revealed, but the pain in her heart and all of her body aches and bruises finally caught up to her, and she gave in to the darkness.

————

“You know, for a bird, you’re pretty easy to find in the city.” 

Bluebird is a little startled when Supergirl lands at their side. They stand up from their crouched position on a parking garage and look up at the heroine. The eyes behind the glass look hollow.

“What’s wrong?” Supergirl asked. “You look a little down.”

Bluebird tipped their beak away from Supergirl and back down at the ground far below the two of them. They don’t appear to be interested in answering that question.

“Can I ask you something? Or- a few somethings?”

The bird seems a little miffed, but they look at Supergirl again anyway. A small breath is blown out from the holes beneath the mask.

“Alright,” Supergirl moves her hair to reveal a small camera sitting on her shoulder, presumably attached to the suit. She sees Bluebird hunch in their shoulders uncomfortably. “I know, I know- you probably don’t want to be recorded. But I just need to ask you some questions, alright? Since you don’t speak, I’ll have someone translate your sign language. Okay? See, nothing bad. That’s the only reason why I have this camera.” 

Bluebird doesn’t seem convinced, but they nod anyway.

“Alright... Thank you. Let’s start out easy, okay? Are you a boy or a girl?”

Bluebird does their signs- they stick out their thumb and streak it down the cheek of their mask. Supergirl nods, despite having no idea what the gesture meant.

“Are you an alien? And if not, how did you get your powers?”

Bluebird taps their pointer finger, middle finger, and thumb together, then began making very rapid signs to answer the second question- Supergirl assumes that they answered “no” to the first question. She wished she knew ASL so she could ask more about that because it was so strange for a human to have such incredible powers, but she moved on.

“Why are you here? Are you a threat?”

Bluebird raised their beak, almost like they were offended. Their hand movements were faster, more snappy than before. 

“Are you willing to help my organization?”

More signs Supergirl couldn’t understand.

“Who are you?”

This time, Bluebird doesn’t do anything. The moon peeks out from the clouds overhead and silver rays cast down in just the right way to make the narrowed eyes beneath the glass sparkle. 

“Sorry,” Supergirl said. “You can relax now. That’s all the question I have right now. Was that so hard?”

Bluebird doesn’t answer, or do anything for that matter. 

“You’re mad at me, aren’t you?”

A breath is blown out again.

“Yyyup.” Supergirl laughed slightly. “Cheer up! I’m leaving, now! I’ll let you brood in peace again, okay? But don’t be surprised if I need to record you again- the people I work for REALLY like you. You’ve got some fans!” 

She lifts into the air. Bluebird continues to watch her.

“Bye! Be safe!”

With that, she flew off and the night swallowed her up.

————

Lena nearly threw her mug of coffee when she saw the masked figure standing on her office balcony. She froze in her place mid-step, watching as it turns around to face her.

“You’re...them.” She whispered. The glass door to the balcony was shut, but the person- creature- _thing_ must have been able to read lips or something because they slowly lifted a gloved hand and pointed to themselves. “You’re Bluebird.”

They nodded.

“Oh my god...” Lena quickly put her cup of coffee down and opened the door. Bluebird looks surprised at her hospitality- she doesn’t know how she came to that revelation due to the lack of facial features, but they just did.Their body language spoke louder than expressions. “Come in! C-come in!”

Was she sweating? She was definitely sweating. Her hands are shaking, too. Was she scared? No, not scared, just...amazed. Was this really happening?

Bluebird puts one foot inside, looked around, then cautiously walked in fully. They spun in circles a few times, taking in the entirety of the office while Lena watched in awe at her desk. For some reason, they seemed more like a cat than a bird.

Lena reached for her phone and Bluebird rears away. They scramble for the balcony door to escape and Lena instantly drops the device.

“Wait! Don’t go! I’m sorry!”

Bluebird is already out the door, but they pause. Their beak turns back to Lena.

“I won’t take any pictures or videos.” Lena said.

Bluebird seems skeptical. They raised their hands and signed something, only to stop and drop their arms. Lena’s eyes widen.

“No, go on!” She urged. “I took ASL in high school. I know some.”

Bluebird visibly perks up and it makes Lena’s heart flutter in a weird sort of way. Who knew a masked bird person-creature could be so cute?

The bird raised their hands and began to sign again. It would be embarrassing to ask them to repeat themselves, so Lena watched closely and wracked her brain to remember each gesture. What she got was bits and pieces, but she understood enough.

_ No. Telling. Online. News. _

“You don’t want me to post about this in the news.” Lena said. Bluebird is genuinely pleased at her understanding and they nod. “Okay. I won’t. I promise.

_ Secret? _

Lena smiled. “Yes. This can be our little secret.”

_Secret._

Bluebird nods and steps back inside. They quietly shut the door behind them and look at Lena.

“So,” Lena leaned against her desk. “Why are you here? How do you know who I am?”

Bluebird’s hands flutter in the air as they try to come up with something to say.

_ You. S-U-P-E-R-G-I-R-L. Friend. Trust. _

God, Lena really had to sharpen her ASL skills. She had to take a moment to process the signs she did understand, hoping that her hesitation didn’t dishearten Bluebird and upset them.

(Why did she care so much about this thing? Where is this feeling of affection coming from?)

“You know I’m friends with Supergirl.” Lena said. 

Bluebird nods.

“And...that makes you think you can trust me.” Lens guessed next.

Another nod.

“How did you know where I was, though?”

Bluebird hesitates.

_Know. Much._

Their beak tips up and Lena thinks they might be grinning.

“Oh, what a naughty bird.” She said. “That- that was weird. I am so sorry.”

Bluebird’s shoulder’s shake and Lena swore she heard what sounded like a giggle emit from their mask. It makes her heart flutter once again.

“Anyway- you can trust me, okay? I won’t tell anyone about this.” She said. “You must be lonely out there. Do you have anyone else? A family? A flock?” She laughs at her bird joke, but it dies off when she sees Bluebird’s shoulders droop. “You...don’t have a family?”

_ So-so. _

“A bad one?”

_ No. Difficult. Don’t. Talk. Please. _

“You don’t want to talk about it,” Lena nodded. “Alright. It’s not my business.”

Bluebird looks up at Lena like she’s the sun at that. It makes her want to smile and frown at the same time.

“You have a lot of people up in your business, huh?” She said. 

_ Yes. _

“Yeah, the news here is pretty crazy.” Lena said. “Sorry about that.”

Bluebird waved their hand. As they were signing, their fingers twitched oddly and they gripped tightly at their right wrist.

“You’re hurt!” Lena said. She walked over to Bluebird, but they stepped away. Their stance said it all- they were afraid of her getting too close. “I’m not going to hurt you.” Her voice softens. “I promise, Blue.”

Whether it be from her apparent calming aura or the impromptu, sudden nickname, Bluebird let their guard fall and held out their hand to Lena. She takes it and guided them to sit on the couch with her. 

Lena examines the glove first- the black leather was mangled and peeling. There were holes, slices, and patches missing, yet they were still somehow intact. Blood was oozing out from the fabric orifices, so she carefully pulled the article off. Beneath it, she was slightly surprised to find the hand so normal- no scales or feathers or even claws. It was just a regular human hand.

A regular human band with a dirty, wet bandage wrapped around it, that is.

Lena gently unwrapped the bandages to reveal gruesome puncture holes and cuts stretching across Bluebird’s palm, all bleeding dark red human blood. 

“Oh, Bluebird,” Lena murmured. “What happened to you?”

Bluebird started to sign with their left hand, and their right hand’s fingers instinctively twitched to join in, but Lena quickly stops them.

“Actually- don’t sign. Just sit still, alright? I’ll clean you up.”

Bluebird gazed up at her silently. They watched her grab the first aid kit from a drawer in her desk (Kara had INSISTED she kept one in her office) and then sit back down beside them. 

“Brace yourself. This might sting a little.”

Antiseptic startled the bird. They lurch in their seat and squirm in pain at the sting of disinfectant biting into their wounds, but not a sound was uttered from their throat.

“There,” Lena said after redressing Bluebird’s hand. “Much better!”

Bluebird tentatively pulled their hand back. They looked at the bandages and flexed their fingers, causing them to keel over their wrist.

“Birdbrain.” Lena laughed. “It’s still going to hurt, you silly bird.”

Bluebird nodded once, like they were just realizing that. Lena laughed again, but it quickly tapers off when they reach for their glove on her lap. She swats at their hand and they jerk away with a startled wave of their beak. 

“That thing is filthy!” Lena barked.

Bluebird signed something miserably and reached for the glove again, but Lena snatches it up and holds it out of their reach. 

“Calm down,” She said as the bird appeared to get self conscious over their hand showing. “I’ll make you a new one!”

Bluebird froze. 

_ Really? _

Lena smiled and signed, “Yes.” Her heart flutters at the way Bluebird’s good hand flutters at their side and then, suddenly, there’s a bird in her arms. 

Bluebird was hugging her.

“Cuddlebug.” Lena chuckled. “Cuddle _bird_.” She shook her head and hugged Bluebird back. She could feel them nuzzling their beak against her chest and she saw that as permission to gently stroke their head. Beneath the fabric covering their skull, she could definitely feel hair. 

Eventually, the two pull away and Lena stands up. Bluebird watches her as she retrieves one of her mittens from the desk.

“Here,” She gently tugs it onto Bluebird’s hand. “You can wear this for now.”

Bluebird stared at the fuzzy cream-colored mitten in awe before hugging Lena again. It took her by surprise like the last time, but it wasn’t unwanted. To have so much trust put into her felt...amazing.

“As payment, can I ask you a kind of weird question?” Lena asked after they parted again. Bluebird nodded. “Are you a boy or a girl? Or neither? I don’t want to insult you if you’re non-binary because I totally respect that, but using the right pronouns is a big thing nowadays and I don’t want to insult you or anyt-”

Bluebird stuck out their thumb and streaks it against their cheek.

“Girl.” Lena said to herself. She grinned widely. “You’re a girl!”

Bluebird looked themselves- _herself_ over as if to check. Lena laughed.

_ A girl cuddlebird. How adorable. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> can’t believe Lena said, “my bird now”


End file.
